"That's motion capture. Mr. John Wolf looked at the staff in charge of the demonstration in front of him, made hand movements, and introduced to the students next to him: "We first sensor the actor, and then let him perform various movements according to the needs of the plot. He pointed and added, "The camera captures his movements, and then transmits them to the computer through the device, so we can see the results in real time." ”

The empty studio is all pitch-black, and in the center a white man in a black leotard with white sensors plastered all over his body dances in the pale yellow light. Around him are three infrared cameras, capturing his movements in a triangular shape.

Wang Yang and a dozen other students followed him to the computer not far away, John Wolf sat down in a chair, held the mouse and clicked a few times, only to see a green three-dimensional model moving in the software window on the screen, which was the movement of the white man in front. "This is just the beginning, if you want to animate characters, you're going to need other graphics techniques," says John Wolff......

The time has come to mid-March, as early as mid-February, the list of nominees for the 73rd Academy Awards was announced, not as predicted by the previous media, Natalie Portman was shortlisted for Best Actress, becoming the first actress among the post-80s actresses to be nominated for an Oscar, and for a time she received countless praises, not only the number of fans has skyrocketed, she is simply the new national idol in the United States, if it weren't for her studies, she would be the most popular and concerned girl in Hollywood now, Rao is so, she also easily connected the covers of several magazines, and"Scheduled Actress" Julia Roberts goes hand in hand.

In the Best Actor award, Will Smith was successfully selected, and competed for the honor of Best Actor with the two main rivals Russell Crowe and Tom Hanks. Will has always been the king of popularity, especially among teenagers, and this result naturally makes his fans extremely happy, last year Will was just trampled by Jin Sumei and was useless, but he did not fall, he immediately made the best response: the Oscar nomination for Best Actor.

Fans are shouting "Will should win the Golden Man"; the public relations department of Flame Movies is not inert, coupled with Will Smith's own interpersonal relationships, so many newspapers and media have stood in Will's camp and advocated momentum: "His interpretation is impeccable!", "This is a legend belonging to black people, the best portrayal of the American dream, the stories of Chris Gardner and Will Smith are all moving...... He will end the monopoly of white people on the Oscars for many years, and become the second black actor after Sidney Poitier!"

In addition to the nomination for the best actor, "When Happiness Knocks on the Door" also received nominations for Best Props Set and Best Original Score, while "Juno" won Best Original Screenplay and Best Original Song.

There was no best director, and Wang Yang exploded a "small upset" and lost the selection. Although many media and the public have guessed this result beforehand, many people are still very dissatisfied and denounce the Oscar judges for being old and conservative, which has not changed for decades.

In 1989, the 26-year-old "prodigy director" Steven Soderbergh won the best picture at the Cannes Film Festival for "Sex, Lies, and Videotape", but the following year's Oscars, the 27-year-old prodigy was only nominated for Best Original Screenplay, and in 2001, the 21-year-old "baby director" Wang Yang was the same, although he was the youngest nominee for the Golden Globe Award for Best Director.

However, Steven Soderbergh, a former prodigy and now 38, has set a record for the Golden Globe Award and then set an Oscar record this year with "Never Compromise" and "Drug Network", and has been nominated for two best director nominations, becoming one of the biggest favorites;

This year's nominees include Ang Lee, Ridley Scott ("Gladiator"), and Stephen Dudley ("Dancing Life").

The American film awards are not only the Golden Globe Awards and Oscars, all kinds of awards are dazzling, like the kind of popular candidates who sweep the awards, many times it is not clear how many awards they have won. First of all, there are various associations, the Producers Guild, the Directors Guild, the Actors Guild, the Cinematographers Guild, the Screenwriters Guild...... There are also countless film critics' associations in Los Angeles, New York, radio, etc., and various awards such as the Saturn Award and the Young Artist Award.

"When Happiness Knocks on the Door" and "Juno" have swept many award nominations, which are almost a copy of the Oscars; in terms of personal honors, Wang Yang has also received at least a dozen Best Director nominations from associations, of which the heaviest is the Directors Guild, this award is the most important weather vane for the Oscar Best Director, only 4 times since the 53rd session The results are different from the Oscars, and this year's award-winning director is Ang Lee.

In any case, this year's Oscars are not in the competition for best director, so what about next year? It naturally depends on the movies he launched this year, but to the disappointment of fans, he has always "made high-speed masterpieces" but suddenly stopped and returned to USC to go to school, and it seems that he has no idea of directing movies. Of course, he also has a new production plan, the youth dance film "Sweetheart", which is also something that fans, especially singing and dancing fans, are excited about.

"A cool girl, a cool bunch of young people, I'm sure 'Sweetheart' will make everyone like it. When fans saw Wang Yang's words, and a few days later, Flame Movies announced that the candidate to play the heroine "Sweetheart" was Jessica, which first made the expectations of young people soar, Magic Yang will not push a bad movie to his girlfriend, right?

However, there are also some gossip media who say conclusively that this is because Natalie became an Oscar nominee with "Juno", Jessica is very angry, and Wang Yang made "Sweetheart" to soothe his girlfriend's emotions: "It can be seen from the name of the movie that this is a love show for them." But Wonder Young clearly didn't have much faith in the film, so he chose not to direct, but to produce it. ”

In fact, Wang Yang is really not sure if "Sweetheart" can be a big hit, but he is absolutely confident, and he will do his best to produce it, no matter what aspect, whether it is to please his girlfriend or not, he will not allow himself to mess up, so he chose not to direct. But for the script of "Sweetheart", during the month, he racked his brains every day to refine the specific content, and also went to many hip-hop bars and other places to find ideas, while not forgetting to synthesize the success of similar movies in his mind.

The script and framing of "Sweetheart" were nearly completed day by day, and when the time came on March 1, its completion slowed down suddenly, as the Robert Zemeckis Center for Digital Arts was officially inaugurated at the USC School of Film and Television, and on the opening day, Wang Yang, as one of the patrons, happily attended the opening ceremony, and the next day, he took off his suit and leather shoes, put on his trench coat and sneakers, and became an ordinary college student, spending the day on the University Park campus during the day and returning to his home in Beverly Hills at night.

Movie special effects and digital technology are the main things Wang Yang wants to learn. Of course, he is a director, not a special effects artist or programmer, he does not learn those specific computer software techniques, but learns how to make and shoot, and this knowledge also provides inspiration when creating and designing storyboards, and also allows the director to think about what special effects technology to use, how to shoot to achieve the picture, and how to work with special effects artists, etc.

In just half a month, he has figured out and learned a lot of special effects technology, such as some of the miniature model shooting and image synthesis that he knew before, and the real harvest is these new or old digital technologies, digital technology is a film revolution, which has truly liberated the director's mind, and it can be said that in this era, as long as he is willing to spend money, no matter what kind of picture can be realized.

Computer imaging, motion capture, virtual shooting, ...... But he didn't just spend time at the Digital Arts Center, and with the idea of not getting a degree, he would sometimes sneak out to places like the post-production center sponsored by George Lucas, named after his wife, Marcia Lucas. Although USC is best known for directing films, he has learned a lot of other things, that the film is a whole, and the more you know about it, the more control you have as a producer and director.

Anyway, in the past half a month, he has benefited a lot, and he feels like Mario has eaten a big mushroom and has been promoted to one level. If he suddenly wants to make a special effects blockbuster now, he won't be at a loss for how to direct it.

"Jessica, did you notice, there are a few moves that you like to do when you're performing. Wang Yang on the sofa looked at Jessica, who was full of seriousness next to him, his eyes looked upward, and said, "This is the first one." Then he twisted his neck from side to side and smiled, "This is the second one, but you are more flexible than mine." ”

Jessica smiled suspiciously, "It's not good? I haven't even paid attention to this, that's how it acts." Wang Yang laughed and said with a smile: "This is not surprising, you usually talk like this." It's not good or bad, it depends on when it's used. You can't use the same small movements to create different characters, otherwise where are the differences?" Jessica nodded silently, then rolled her eyes slightly, "I know, I think I should improve my facial expression skills." ”

"Look, it's here again!" your eyes, and ......" Wang Yang laughed, shrugged his shoulders and said, "This is the third one." Jessica raised her eyebrows, put her hands on her head, and said with wide eyes: "It seems that I want to do this!" Wang Yang smiled, hugged her and said: "Jesse, reducing body language can be more natural, I think you know this better than me." What I'm going to say is the power of your performance......"

In the past month, the two of them have played a "director-actor game" in the evening, and he accompanies her in performance training, giving her advice and opinions, and explaining "sweetheart", creating this character together, turning her from a bunch of text settings into a real person on the screen.

After a month, I don't know if it's an illusion or what, he feels that Jessica's acting skills have improved a lot, of course, as she said, her acting skills were quite good a month ago, although they are far less powerful than Natalie, but they are completely different from when they were in "Youth Musical" more than two years ago.

After a little more training, they finished the night's game. Wang Yang turned on the TV with the remote control, and as soon as the TV was turned on, a passionate voice sounded, and the screen played the picture of the basketball players beating their chests passionately: "NCAA National Championship, the first round has officially begun!Who will continue to the road to the championship......" Wang Yang turned his head to look at Jessica, and said excitedly: "By the way, you know that tomorrow our USC home game against Oklahoma will be big, let's go and see it!" He sighed again: "Wow, this year is really exciting!"

He loves basketball, the NCAA, and USC, and after half a month of college life, his passion for the collision of these three suddenly returned. This is the first time the Trojans have reached a national championship since he entered the USC, and it will be his first experience of March Madness.

Previously, he had already made predictions on his blog for this year's top four, the University of Michigan, Illinois, and Stanford, and finally in the Eastern Region, he chose USC instead of the popular Duke University. This choice has feelings and reason, USC has not entered the tournament stage for several years, and all USC people have long been suffocated, and this return to the top 32 can be described as morale like a rainbow, and it will definitely make a difference.

"Well, yes!" Jessica smiled happily, looked at the TV screen, and said with interest, "I haven't been to the NCAA yet, and I was invited to watch a UCLA game before, and I declined." ”

"What, ucla!?" Wang Yang suddenly shouted with a shocked face. Jessica looked at him stunned and said, "I didn't go." Wang Yang nodded solemnly, laughed again, pressed her shoulder and said, "Good refusal! Never support UCLA! Those bitches raised ......"

USC and UCLA have always been bitter rivals, and both schools seem to be competing for each other's strengths and weaknesses, and both think they are better than each other. In particular, in sports, the relationship between rugby and basketball is "incompatible", and the week before the football game between the two schools is called "Beat-SC-Week" by UCLA, and the two schools also raise their defensive alerts to prevent the logo representing the school from being damaged by the other party. It's not unheard of, the Troy bronze statue of the USC and the bear statue of the UCLA have been splashed with paint that represents the color of their own schools.

There is a lot of crazy stuff and a lot of verbal fights, just like UCLA students call USC "University-of-Second-Choice." At the beginning, Wang Yang just felt funny and disdainful when he heard it, regardless of other professional subjects, as far as film is concerned, USC is the best university in his heart, UCLA is not even a second choice, and New York University Film School is better than it. However, he didn't react much, because he thought that everyone was for learning, there was nothing to fight about, and the facts were there.

But a few years ago, when he hadn't been expelled, he and a few classmates were ridiculed by a group of UCLA people for not making it to the national championship, although they could also laugh at UCLA's football, but as a basketball fan, from there he and UCLA were mortal enemies in sports.

Thinking of those loud ridicules, Wang Yang's chest couldn't help but feel a little angry, he took a deep breath, and said to Jessica: "You are from USC now, remember, only Trojans!

"Only Trojans!" Jessica nodded solemnly, she knew about the grievances between the two universities, but she didn't expect his reaction to be so big, but her boyfriend is USC, so she naturally supports USC. She held out her palm to him and shouted with a look of hatred, "Let UCLA die!"

Wang Yang clapped her hard and said with a smile: "Yes, we will kill them in the quarterfinals, unless that rotten bear is eliminated by the other schools before......

However, in the end, both USC and UCLA successfully passed the first round, and that night at Los Angeles Memorial Stadium, USC defeated the University of Oklahoma 69-54.

In the second round in a few days' time, USC will travel to Boston to take on Boston College.

(To be continued)