Manpower - A Job
Brief
A longtime client asked us if we could produce a 2 minute CGI animated video for Manpower with a really interesting text driven script. We jumped on the opportunity!
Creative Solution
Pixteur worked on translating the concept text into visuals. The initial art direction we received was a charcoal driven look but it was deemed too dark and didn’t seem upbeat. We pioneered an innovative real-time colorful NPR look that hadn’t been seen before.
This NPR viewport rendering in Blender allowed us instant visual feedback and near real-time exports of 4K renders. It was a joy to work this way rather than deal with offline renders. There are certain limitations like no motion blur and texture swimming. But in this case it was deemed ok as it lent a living, vibrating nature to the characters and the client liked the effect.
All 40+ CGI characters were based on photo-scans of real people. We rigged them and used iClone to transfer and mix motion capture to animate everyone. The motion capture and rig was sent over to Blender for manual cleanup and layout. We were able to tweak the animation with several layers for hand animation to add detail and extra actions on top. This was a fun and fast method of working, allowing us to complete all the work in record time.
Credits
CGI & Post / Pixteur
Tools / Blender, iClone, CC4, After Effects
Client / Manpower
Art Director / Steven Wold