Mandalorian

Game changing filmmaking technology

Everything new is well-forgotten or well-upgraded old. Epic Games, one of the biggest computer games production company, announced the release of new Unreal Engine 5. At the same time filmmakers started talking about a game changing period in filmmaking process. How is it connected escpecially during the pandemia?

Oksana Belousova

CEO & Founder of MY KINOROOM, Film Director

About a century ago when filmmakers couldn't shoot some locations due to physical or financial limits, they invented rear projection. They projected the image of a needed location on the screen, immitating the background, and put some real props and actors in the front of it. Thus two spaces were combined and looked as a united one in a film. This technology existed for nearly half a century until green screen and visual effects appeared, which solved problems with limitations of projected images, bulkiness and noise of projectors, immobility of actors, etc. But in return green screen placed filmmakers in artificial space where they constantly had to imagine the final result, and in fact made the entire look of the film in post-production. This pushed filmmakers to invent the "new method".

So, in The Mandalorian, the first live action series in the "Star Wars" franchise, instead of green screen they used LED-screens, which images were generated on with the help of game engine. This process made it possible to work with the background in real time - choose fragments of scenes, modify lighting, change lenses and shift focus. The rear projection became interactive.

Moreover, they also started using game engine during previsualization stage instead of original storyboards and as a template for VR projects. It helps filmmakers to see the final result in advance and cut significantly the post-production period.

It's hard to say if it also cuts the expenses, but it will be more technically convenient to shoot any location without leaving a "room" with a small crew.