"For example, the great Director Zhang and Director Feng never learned what CG was in film school, and there may not even be an older generation of directors who know the real production process of CG. ”

"In Hollywood, after the script is finalized, there is the position of special effects director as soon as possible, because CG is the highlight of the whole movie, and it is the essence of spending a lot of money to do it. ”

"In China, more often it is to save money, for a simple example, to do a building explosion in China, it is often because the price of a real explosion is too high to use the computer, so once your offer is higher than the real shot, it will be passed. ”

"The reason why the price can be very high in foreign countries is often because the director wants to make the building explode with the special visual effects he wants, and the real-life explosion is difficult to achieve. ”

"Therefore, the price of the special effects company will be very high, and the production staff will also be very enthusiastic to achieve effects that no one else has ever achieved, which is an honor!"

"In the past, I often heard that a director accused the domestic special effects team of how bad it was, but after contact, I realized that the hype was greater than the reality. ”

"There are more than one or two films that have been reworked from abroad and then reworked in China, and a master once asked me to count the names of our domestic special effects producers in the prologue of the 84th Academy Awards for Best Visual Effects?"

"I even threw down a sentence: Of all the special effects that can be seen on the market, one is counted as one, and they dare to pat their chests and say that there is nothing they can't do!"

Speaking of this, Ding Cheng resonated very much, and asked himself if we are really bad at technology?

Even if there is no "2012" yet, do you think there is a domestic director who can clearly depict the scene of a 100-magnitude earthquake?

Even if there is no "Avatar" today, do you think there will be a director who can clearly depict a beautiful planet of Pandora with you?

Could it be that the director can give him a Pandora planet by making a beautiful sentence and playing with special effects?

"Ready Player One cost $175 million, of which more than $100 million was spent on special effects. Wang Tian sighed: "The production cost of "Transformers 5" is 217 million US dollars, and special effects account for 130 million US dollars. ”

"Avatar cost $237 million to make, with special effects accounting for $150 million. "Spider-Man 3" cost $258 million to make, and special effects accounted for $155 million. "Pirates of the Caribbean 3" cost $342 million to make, and special effects accounted for $200 million......"

"There are many examples of this, but for Hollywood visual blockbusters, special effects costs account for at least 60% of the total production costs!"

Ding Cheng secretly said to himself, in this way, an average of two hours for a movie, hundreds of thousands of dollars a second is really not a joke.

Curious, he asked, "Why are you burning so much money?"

"Hey, I've asked a lot of people about this, not to mention the specific difficulty, hardware costs account for 30%, software costs account for 10%, and labor costs account for more than 60%. ”

"In fact, special effects production is just a general term, which is roughly divided into two parts and ten links, namely: three-dimensional special effects: modeling, materials, animation, lighting, rendering, composite effects: keying, erasing Wia, color grading, compositing, and scenery. ”

In other words, it's true that special effects are done on computers, but they are not ordinary computers that we usually use, but large workstations, servers, and tens of millions. ”

"It's such a top-of-the-line hardware, and it also needs to run continuously for more than 50 hours to render one frame of special effects. ”

"And a movie has at least 24 frames per second, and a five-second special effects shot takes 250 days for a machine to render!"

"Large, mature special effects companies like ILM and TAL have their own render farms in-house, with thousands of workstations and servers running day and night.

"Then there's the software, and there's a lot of professional software for each of them, and each of them is expensive. It is not uncommon to install dozens of software at the same time on a machine, and you have to buy the genuine version, all of which are calculated in US dollars. ”

"Weta Digital, the special effects company of "Avatar" and "The Hobbit", I heard that the annual cost of just spending on it is as high as 180 million, is it scary?"

"These are just drizzles, and the most expensive thing is the labor cost. There are many process links, complicated software debugging, and long production, which requires thousands of people to complete it for several years. ”

"I heard that there are 1,855 people in the special effects team of "Avatar", 739 people in "Titanic", 1,453 people in "The Avengers", 1,180 people in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows", and 1,178 people in "Transformers 3", ......"

"The annual salary of an ordinary special effects artist is 40,000 US dollars, the annual salary of a senior special effects artist is 60,000 US dollars, and the annual salary of a top special effects artist is about 150,000 US dollars. Such a team of 1,000 people will cost $57 million a year just in salary!"

"The production cycle of a movie usually takes two or three years, hey, who can raise it?"

"If you haven't studied explosives, you can't do the shocking explosion of time in "Inception" ......"

"If you haven't studied materials science, you can't make a heavy mecha full of texture in "Bad Pacific" ......"

"If you haven't studied biology, you can't restore the lifelike animals of "Fantasy Forest......"

"If you haven't studied physics, you can't imagine the breathtaking high-dimensional space ...... of Interstellar"

"If you haven't studied fluid mechanics, you can't show the beautiful mirror of the ocean in Life of Pi......"

Wang Tian looked at Ding Cheng's shocked appearance and said with a wry smile: "This is only part of the theoretical foundation, and then the master must be familiar with more than 50 kinds of professional software, proficient in at least ten kinds of large-scale software, adapt to the update and iteration of countless plug-ins at any time, and constantly familiarize himself with the new production process......

"Because the special effects technology is basically a small innovation every six months, and a big revolution every two years. It is no exaggeration to say that every top special effects artist is a scientist who has spent countless time and money!"

"Do you know how much money we get every month for the most awesome special effects in our country?"

Wang Tian took a sip of tea and said, "There has never been more than 50,000!"

"Two days ago, I found a few interns from a prestigious university, and I rushed to work for 5,000 a month. ”

"Talking to them, I heard that Ogilvy just died a few days ago with a special effect, according to their words: that buddy's health is too bad, right?"

"Ogilvy seems to be just a design company, only responsible for producing ideas and tracking execution, while a real production company, not going home for three days is just a starting point. What five days without sleeping, seven days without washing the face overtime records simply abound. ”

Looking up at the time, he stood up and said, "It's useless to listen to me, a layman, take you to meet a cowman." ”

Ding Cheng happened to be idle, so he went out together, came to the private room of the hotel, and saw a simple brother in his early thirties.

"Ding Cheng doesn't need me to introduce him, right?" Wang Tian pointed at the little brother and smiled: "This is Yang Yu, nicknamed Dumpling, a real animation special effects director." ”

"Nezha is what he made!"