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Video Games Go To The Movies
The trailer that Vancouver animation studio Rainmaker Entertainment recently finished for Ubisoft does not mark the first time the company has worked with a video game firm, and it certainly won't be the last.
In this age of convergence, the two industries are drawing closer by the day.
"We see this as a growth area for the company," said Rainmaker CEO Warren Franklin. "We're looking at new ways to deliver animation. We have the traditional models of television and feature films, but more and more content gets used on different delivery platforms, like mobile phones."
The 90-second trailer for the Ubisoft game Splinter Cell: Conviction, latest in a franchise of games based on Tom Clancy's fiction, was produced primarily for the Internet and for trade shows -- it was screened last month at the E3 Expo in Los Angeles -- but it was made in very high resolution and could be cut for shorter spots to air on television or play in movie theatres.
Ubisoft, whose Canadian studio is in Montreal, initially contacted Rainmaker last September to make the trailer for the game, which will be released this fall. Video game companies guard their intellectual property as closely as spy agencies guard their secrets, and Rainmaker had to sign non-disclosure agreement documents, and make sure there were no leaks to the Web.
"Confidentiality is crucial in our industry, and it's something we take great care with," said Eric Gallant, Ubisoft's senior international brand manager for Splinter Cell: Conviction. "We have a very strict protocol when we are sharing documents across different companies."
Ubisoft provided Rainmaker with images of its primary characters, the main one being Sam Fisher, and gave them free rein to conceptualize and design the trailer. The conception and storyboard work began in September and took almost four months, and production began in December and lasted five months. A team of 30 to 40 people worked on the trailer, most of them video game players. Twice, Ubisoft executives flew out to Vancouver, and twice Rainmaker leads flew to Montreal. The work on the trailer was viewed daily at Ubisoft.
"Being in the same location is more important when you're brainstorming and getting into the creative elements," Gallant said.
The challenge at Rainmaker was to break from a traditional storytelling model, and create a visual that reflected the universe of the game.
"We had to do a lot of storyboarding and pre-visual work up front," said the trailer's producer-director, Shea Wageman. "It was a lot more time for 90 seconds that you would spend on a typical movie. You have to get all the franchise things into a 90-second story, work with the game publisher to make sure it matches the new game, and make sure it's cool and impactful and has a good hook. You do everything you would do in a film, but you encompass everything in 90 seconds."
Rainmaker has done previous work on video games, providing animation for Ghostbusters and trailers for other games, including Radical Entertainment's Prototype.
"These game engines are getting so high-resolution that it gives us a chance to use animation we do for a feature film or a video," said Franklin, who believes Rainmaker has an advantage over animation companies in other cities.
"Being in Vancouver, where there's a major gaming cluster, that gives us a lot of information and understanding of how games are put together," Franklin said. "We can work closely with the game companies where we incorporate elements from the game, plus add our expertise on top of that and come up with a hybrid. It takes elements from the game, and elements from what we do with animation and visual effects, and putting that together can be visually stunning."
Rainmaker has two other projects with video game companies, though Franklin can't say anything about the work.
The trailer that Vancouver animation studio Rainmaker Entertainment recently finished for Ubisoft does not mark the first time the company has worked with a video game firm, and it certainly won't be the last.
In this age of convergence, the two industries are drawing closer by the day.
"We see this as a growth area for the company," said Rainmaker CEO Warren Franklin. "We're looking at new ways to deliver animation. We have the traditional models of television and feature films, but more and more content gets used on different delivery platforms, like mobile phones."
The 90-second trailer for the Ubisoft game Splinter Cell: Conviction, latest in a franchise of games based on Tom Clancy's fiction, was produced primarily for the Internet and for trade shows -- it was screened last month at the E3 Expo in Los Angeles -- but it was made in very high resolution and could be cut for shorter spots to air on television or play in movie theatres.
Ubisoft, whose Canadian studio is in Montreal, initially contacted Rainmaker last September to make the trailer for the game, which will be released this fall. Video game companies guard their intellectual property as closely as spy agencies guard their secrets, and Rainmaker had to sign non-disclosure agreement documents, and make sure there were no leaks to the Web.
"Confidentiality is crucial in our industry, and it's something we take great care with," said Eric Gallant, Ubisoft's senior international brand manager for Splinter Cell: Conviction. "We have a very strict protocol when we are sharing documents across different companies."
Ubisoft provided Rainmaker with images of its primary characters, the main one being Sam Fisher, and gave them free rein to conceptualize and design the trailer. The conception and storyboard work began in September and took almost four months, and production began in December and lasted five months. A team of 30 to 40 people worked on the trailer, most of them video game players. Twice, Ubisoft executives flew out to Vancouver, and twice Rainmaker leads flew to Montreal. The work on the trailer was viewed daily at Ubisoft.
"Being in the same location is more important when you're brainstorming and getting into the creative elements," Gallant said.
The challenge at Rainmaker was to break from a traditional storytelling model, and create a visual that reflected the universe of the game.
"We had to do a lot of storyboarding and pre-visual work up front," said the trailer's producer-director, Shea Wageman. "It was a lot more time for 90 seconds that you would spend on a typical movie. You have to get all the franchise things into a 90-second story, work with the game publisher to make sure it matches the new game, and make sure it's cool and impactful and has a good hook. You do everything you would do in a film, but you encompass everything in 90 seconds."
Rainmaker has done previous work on video games, providing animation for Ghostbusters and trailers for other games, including Radical Entertainment's Prototype.
"These game engines are getting so high-resolution that it gives us a chance to use animation we do for a feature film or a video," said Franklin, who believes Rainmaker has an advantage over animation companies in other cities.
"Being in Vancouver, where there's a major gaming cluster, that gives us a lot of information and understanding of how games are put together," Franklin said. "We can work closely with the game companies where we incorporate elements from the game, plus add our expertise on top of that and come up with a hybrid. It takes elements from the game, and elements from what we do with animation and visual effects, and putting that together can be visually stunning."
Rainmaker has two other projects with video game companies, though Franklin can't say anything about the work.