For Brian Yuzna’s much anticipated horror film, Amphibious 3D, Komodo Films required a 3D specialist who could deliver high quality stereoscopic experience and expertise in tough humid conditions on a low budget.

Inition supplied stereoscopic consultancy and equipment for Amphibious 3D, a feature film that won the ‘Best Feature Film’ award at the 2010 3D Stereo Media European 3D Film Festival in a competition of 48 entries.

It has wrapped and is now in post production at Galaxy Studios, Belguim. The Netherlands/ Belgium/ Singaporean co-production will be the first 3D movie ever made in Southeast Asia. 

Inition’s Asia Pacific office worked with Komodo Films providing consultancy on pre-production, storyboards, camera and monitoring equipment plus post-production. The shoot took place over 2 months in Jakarta where Inition’s Head of Production for Asia Pacific, Markus Stone, was the lead Stereographer and headed the 3D department. Filming was shot on REDS (WHAT TYPE?)
 
Markus commented: “This was a complex 3D shoot, and was produced in often challenging conditions including the Javanese jungle, on board a boat and in a studio that was a humid 36 degrees every day with the air conditioners turned on. It just goes to show that great 3D is possible on a budget.”

The film now enters the 3D post production phase, with the VFX slate being handled by Victor 3D Studios and Grid in Brussels, with DI handled by Galaxy Studios, all under the instruction of Post Supervisor Hans Van Helden. "For 3D the DI process is a little different", says van Helden; "Firstly you need the capacity to decode and display a dual image stream; in our case RED R3D files. Then there is a process of conforming to the 3D rushes from the 2D offline edit and tweaking the 3D to make sure you have perfect alignment. After that, we have the 'matchgrade' process."

Amphibious is due for release in June 2010.

Red Bee Media hired Inition to shoot a 3D advert promoting a new theme park based gameshow - 'Scream If You Know The Answer' for UKTV.

The brief was to replicate the adrenaline inducing feeling of riding the white knuckle rides at Thorpe Park and after a tough recce day trying all the coasters at the park, the team chose Colussus, the UK's only quadruple-corkscrew coaster.

At the front of the ride the Inition team installed two SI-2K Mini Digital Cinema Cameras in a parallel arrangement on a rugged mounting system designed by Extreme Facilities. To adhere to health and safety requirements, Extreme Facilities modified a crash dummy which housed and contained all the recording equipment.

The footage was finished in-house using our 2K Iridas SpeedGrade system which is suitable for large and small screen 3D projects, ideal as this 3D advert was shown in cinemas and on 3D TV sets in over 1,200 Sky 3D pubs.
 

BMW initiated an online augmented reality campaign to promote the launch of the BMW Z4. Inition worked with Dare to create a unique interactive online brand experience supporting the TV campaign in which a roadster is steered across a blank canvas with the tires providing paint trails and colourful ‘expressions of joy’.

Powered by Inition’s augmented reality technology MagicSymbol, users create their own ‘expression of joy’ online. Users can test drive a virtual 3D Z4 and record their paint trails via the webcam and upload images and videos of their creations to YouTube and Facebook.

Inition's / Dare's BMW AR campaign was rated number 1 in a run-down of the best AR campaigns in Brand Republic. See the run-down for yourself here (we also got the number 6 slot for our Toyota IQ campaign).

Read Revolution magazine's feature "Behind the scenes: BMW's augmented reality campaign" here.

Test drive your own Z4 here.

Inition's sister company Holition partnered with 3D film production experts Pointy Stick to shoot a beautifully art directed promotional film detailing De Beers most dramatic pieces. The 3D film was displayed on a lenticular screens in London, New York and Tokyo, which do not require 3D viewing glasses. The first film was deployed globally, and a second film commissioned for Christmas 2010.

Technical Production

Inition provided stereoscopic expertise for the shoot and throughout post-production on what was a technically challenging 3D workflow requiring 8 individual camera views (rather than the standard left/right for 'normal' stereoscopic 3D) to allow deployment on Alioscopy glasses-free screens, supplied and configured by Inition.

Post production for auto-stereoscopic (glasses-free) live action films is a complex business, requiring effectively 8 separate timelines, each from a slightly different perspective. Retouching and rig removal are a particular challenge.

Deployment

100,000 people stopped and viewed the screen in the first four days of launch. The significant PR exposure that resulted helped lift perceptions of De Beers above those of being a typical jeweller and into the realms of innovative thinkers engaging their consumers with originality and creativity. The film has been previewed in New York and London and China.

"We are delighted with the quality of the production and the ability of the Alioscopy screens to stop people in their tracks. Feedback from Japan has been amazing. The campaign has generated a lot of interest and intrigue into the appearance of the diamonds in 3D and also into the technology that makes it possible."  said Robert Cheng, De Beers Marketing Director

Check out Holition's site at www.holition.com and Pointy Stick at www.pointystickfilms.com

AR without the Markers
The Ford C-MAX augmented reality campaign ran for two weeks across ten shopping malls with over 125,000 curious shoppers interacting with Ford’s Grand C-MAX vehicle. A selection of on-screen icons allowed participants to explore various features of the car including 'Door Slide', 'Seating', 'Power Tail' and 'Spin' with a 'Minority Report' style gesture-controlled interface.

The brief demanded us to track users in the most natural way possible and allow them to ‘play’ with an interactive product advert. No markers or other symbols could be relied on. It also had to ignore people walking past while allowing precise control and selection from the interface.

Proof of Concept
Inition were approached by digital production company Grand Visual who asked if this was possible and thanks to our recent distribution agreement for the Panasonic D-Imager (a Microsoft Kinect-like depth or Z camera) we provided a simple proof-of-concept demo within one day which secured the project.

Over the next few weeks, our in house team of C++ developers developed an application based on OpenFrameWorks and OpenCV SDKs to code the real-time sensing and video display engine. A sophisticated blob tracking and depth thresholding algorithm sensed the participant's hands allowing the car to follow the user's movements. A flocking algorithm gave a fluid, graceful movement around the screen with the optimum amount of 'bounce'. Full HD resolution, portrait graphics, webcam capture, depth and video camera aspect matching and alignment, gestural user interface, interaction logging for usage analysis and hardware fault tolerance were added before going live.

Fine Tuning and Feedback at Every Stage
An important part of the project was the ability to "fine tune" and "play" with all the control parameters via an on-screen interface. On-screen debugging and depth camera modes allowed us to optimise every aspect of the interaction experience. Our development team provided regular “work in progress” videos and executable versions for the client allowing feedback to be incorporated at every stage.

Inition were present for repeated on-site testing with JCDecaux prior to deployment to ensure the software could cope with the rigours of the real-world environment. Issues included reflection scatter from glass shop windows which were tackled with temporal and contrast filtering of the depth image.

Check out the video above to see the installation in action!

Our first 'Future of 3D' project!

We decided to have some 3D fun with Shannon's head to celebrate our 10th Birthday and the launch of our 'Future of 3D' series.

We really enjoyed this side project as it combined a wide range of our skills and 3D technologies. But mainly because it involved blowing stuff up!

If you're interested in finding out more, make sure you watch the video above.

Some of the kit we used:  ZPrinter 450, Mephisto EX Scanner, Phantom/Quasar 3D Stereoscopic Filming Rig

We'd like to point out that no Shannon's were harmed in this project, although strangely enough. he had a slight headache afterwards. Check out our Future of 3D blog at fo3d.posterous.com for our latest experiments.

About our 'Future of 3D' series

The 'Future of 3D' series is about exploring the boundaries of future 3D technology through non-commercial creative projects. Supporting this type of work is core to Inition's core values of developing new uses of 3D technology, supporting creativity and nurturing the passion of it's staff and collaborators. If you have an idea for a 'Future of 3D' project, we'd love to hear from you.

The producers of the UK’s largest consumer electronics show – The Gadget Show Live, worked closely with Inition to develop ideas and technical solutions to engage the show’s audience in groundbreaking, fun and genuinely new ways.

Inition operates a busy R&D department which always sets out to go beyond the standard brief and for The Gadget Show Live, we developed bespoke software and technical solutions to achieve just that. We developed a unique vote capture system, a mass interactive game and a motion capture showpiece.

Flash Camera Voting

In a signature Gadget Show challenge, two of the presenters went head to head to win over the audience with a singing performance. Rather than asking people to vote for their favourite performer via SMS, Inition created a voting system that could register an individual’s preference via a flash from their camera phone.

Within two seconds, a camera rig on the stage captured each flash of light/vote which was processed by proprietary software developed by Inition Creative Production (? - IS THAT RIGHT). The system was able to register and count each vote and present the results graphically on large LED screens within 15 seconds.

Robust and highly accurate, our reliable system could even detect (and disregard) multiple votes from a single individual up to 80 metres away. It is highly scalable too. With more cameras, we could even increase the field of view of the rig up to 360 degrees and register the votes of tens of thousands of audience members up to 150 metres away and beyond.

Mass Drone Gaming

For the mass drone gaming section, a divided audience competed with the other half in a challenge to steer a mini drone towards a circle on a large LED screen using the motion of their arms and pitch of their voices. The winning team would be the one best able to co-ordinate their arm movements and voices as detected by the Inition sensors. Three standard 720p USB webcams were housed in a single rig angled in multiple directions. Rewritten drivers and settings would achieve the desired framerates. Inition’s own software, based on proprietary and various open source libraries, could accurately translate the motion of people's gesticulations to guide the flying drone towards a target. Further software was able to detect the pitch of vocal noises from the installed microphones - the higher the pitch, the higher the drone would fly.

A Virtual Strip

To get Suzi's avatar to do the strip, Jason entered the marker-less LILA system which is portable enough to be easily rigged up on stage. Jason mimed the start of the strip up until a key moment when an Inition developed animation of a Suzi Perry avatar stripping to a bare wireframe model seamlessy blended into Jason's real time avatar motion.

Conclusion

The Gadget Show Live event was regarded as a huge success receiving  exceptional feedback from the audience, producers and even the presenters themselves. The system we used for the Gadget Show Live is part of our growing collection of mass audience interaction software called 'TAP' which features audience movement detection and sound processing for control, driving games with coloured steering wheels and quizzes.

Inition will be running a 'TAP' quiz event in Rome at the end of august which will use coloured voting cards and we are currently in talks with largescale live event organisers which will run up to the end of the year.

Inition provided rock band Keane with depth information of front man Tom Chaplin singing to add a new dimension to their new music video, Spiralling.

We were approached by Andras Ketzer, the video's director, with a request to record a singing head, extract Z-depth and colour information and provide 3D data giving him the ability to manipulate the head in a 3D modelling program.

Keane's lead singer Tom Chaplin was filmed using our 2K stereoscopic filming system, based on Silicon Imaging cameras (3DVidRig-SI), with a pattern projected on the singer to help with the depth-extraction algorithms. We then used Inition's 3D conversion facility, to generate a Z-depth image at 25 frames per second and After smoothing, the z-depth images were used as a displacement map to create 3D geometry.

We provided 3D data as a sequence of greyscale heightmap images (z-depth). This gave the director the ability to render his animated head from any angle at any point in time making a very unique memorable music video.

After collaborating with Inition on several test shoots, world famous fashion photographer Rankin chose Inition to supply the stereoscopic crew, expertise and equipment for a new pop music promo from Kelis called ‘Scream’. 

3D on a 2D Schedule

It was essential that the 3D aspect did not add time to the one day/2D schedule. Inition used an Element Technica Quasar rig and SI-2K 3D camera system. Element Technica's motorised alignment, excellent rigidity and precise alignment, meant less correction was required on set and in post production, ideal when time was of the essence as it was with the Kelis 'Scream' production schedule.

Brett Turnbull, DP on the shoot said: "We shot 'Scream' in 2D and 3D simultaneously using the same camera system. The whole set-up was very flexible and mobile, allowing us to experiment and see instant 3D playback on set. With an ambitious storyboard and limited shooting time, it was a real bonus that shooting in 3D actually had very little impact on the day's schedule.” 

On the day of shooting, Inition supplemented the regular crew with a stereographer, rig technician and camera assistant, and supervised the post production which was completed at OnSight, ensuring that Rankin’s trademark photographic style was not comprised and actually enhanced by the stereography.

YouTube Hit

‘Scream’ 3D by Kelis was launched as an anaglyph 3D video exclusively on video sharing website YouTube, generating over half a million hits and counting. It features an exciting combination of negative and postive parallax shots, perfectly suited for the genre of a music video.

Inition's crew and equipment ensured the production schedule was adhered too and the director was able to fully concentrate on the creative process.

Watch 'Scream' by Kelis below (anaglyph 3D glasses required)

Six Nations Live to 40 Cinemas

40 cinemas across the country screened England’s home RBS Six Nations games live in 3-D. Archibald Ingall Stretton commissioned 3D specialists Inition to produce the matches which became the largest ever UK sports event to be broadcast live in 3D. Forty Odeon and Cineworld cinemas screened the matches, beginning with England’s official centenary game, against Wales on February 6, as part of a deal with O2, the England sponsor. The match against Ireland on February 27 was also screened live in 3-D.

3D Technology

Using the latest 3D camera technology, the matches were captured from seven camera positions providing a comprehensive view of the game which included replays, match statistics and on-screen graphics. Inition worked with outside broadcast experts SIS Live and used 3D 'Quasar' rigs from Element Technica for the shoot. Broadcast graphics specialists Wurmsers creating bespoke stereoscopic graphics for the game.

Production Team

The BBC is the UK TV rights holder for the 6 Nations – played between England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, France and Italy – and assisted Inition in the broadcast. Inition has worked on a number of 3D productions from football and ice hockey to track and music events. Inition were also the 3D experts behind the 3D transmissions of England’s clash with Scotland at Murrayfield, in 2008, as part of a 3D test for the BBC.

Read TVB Europe's inside story on the project here

Read about the GOLD award we received for this project as winners of the Internationalist Awards for Innovation in Media here

When the producers of North One Television approached 3D creative services company Inition to provide the technical expertise for an ambitious 'virtual presenter' challenge, LILA was an obvious solution.

LILA is a portable motion capture solution which was used to capture the motion of The Gadget Show presenter Suzi Perry in London and transmit that captured data to drive an avatar of Suzi who was composited in The Gadget Show studios, all in real time.

Marker-less Motion Capture

Based on real-time 3D animation software Autodesk MotionBuilder, LILA is Inition’s marker-less motion capture solution which can provide show stopping interactive installations for brands, exhibitions, tours and marketing agencies.

Without any calibration required, Suzi stepped into the holo-deck style cube at Inition’s London studios where her silhouette was tracked by 14 x 2D cameras. No markers or special clothing were required. The vision processor software calculated a 3D mesh of her body from these views of which a digital skeleton was applied using the Organic Motion plugin.

The frame-by-frame motion co-ordinates from the data was then transmitted to the MotionBuilder system at North One Television studios in Birmingham via a special driver which then applied Suzi Perry’s features such as clothes, hair, skin tones etc in real time. The avatar of Suzi which was composited into the studios of The Gadget Show next to the real co-presenter Otis and an android version of Jason Bradbury who she was competing with.

Suzi’s avatar character included full face expressions and mouth shapes driven by Suzi's voice fed through LILA's voice recognition software.

The composited footage was sent back to Inition’s London studios via Skype which Suzi could monitor on a screen seeing exactly what the public would see.

A World First

This project posed several challenges, not least because of the processing power required to deliver the avatar in real time. This was the first time a motion capture system had been used to drive another avatar over the Internet.

The LILA motion capture is a complete attention grabbing solution which is available for events, promotions and exhibitions. As well as hire of the LILA system itself, Inition also provide a complete production service with the hardware, software, and creative design of the characters, environments and interactions.