Wang Zhiou's team took a group photo when they participated in the opening ceremony
"The story of a snowflake, the general director took us to design for three years." On February 7, the third day after the opening ceremony of the Beijing Winter Olympic Games, Wang Zhiou, visual effects director of the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games, wrote such a sentence in the circle of friends.
Wang Zhiou rehearsed the scene at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games
Think back to that day, Li Chun. The ethereal spirit of ice and snow and the greenery of spring grow into great vitality, and the romance and fantasy of Chinese, which amaze the world in the fusion of science and technology and art. From the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games to the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, 14 years have passed in a flash, how to show the world the contemporary Chinese style at the opening ceremony, highlight the Chinese aesthetics, and tell the Chinese story well, but throughout.
As a young generation who grew up after the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Wang Zhiou caught up with the good times of the motherland's economic, social and cultural development. His collaboration with Zhang Yimou began at the "Beijing 8 Minutes" at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics. Wang Zhiou said: "The director is extremely demanding, has a wild idea, and is also pursuing aesthetics to the extreme. And what he had to do was to lead the team to turn all the director's ideas into a visual solution.
Wang Zhiou
"The director wants to make an ignition plan, we have to design the torch table, and we must also run the relationship between the small snowflakes inside and the torch." Therefore, Wang Zhiou led the visual effects team to weave a big snowflake with Chinese knots and olive branches through digital visual programming. The large snowflake installation is 14.899 meters wide and has 96 small snowflakes of Chinese knots inside, surrounded by olive garlands and 6 olive branches, with 550,000 luminous spots.
Wang Zhiou and the North India teacher team
"This is a perfect combination of Chinese elements and the world."
The new technology has brought a new depth of field space and narrative method, expressing the common emotions of human beings through the story of snowflakes and conveying the concept of building a community with a shared future for mankind. At the same time, through the "science and technology + art" to present the beauty of nature, the beauty of humanities and the beauty of sports, simple but not simply to create a romantic, ethereal immersive experience, greatly reducing the investment of manpower and material resources, in the prevention and control of the epidemic and the practice of low-carbon environmental protection concept has played a key role, the achievement of digital technology in the history of the Olympic Games a pioneering move.
Director Zhang Yimou took a group photo with the creative members of Wang Zhiou's team
In order to achieve this initiative, the visual effects team led by Wang Zhiou is challenging the impossible every day. He laughed and said, "Every day is a college entrance examination, and we strive to achieve the ultimate in every direction." "This visual effects team of more than 200 young Chinese people covers art, design and digital engineering, and is comparable to the world's top digital technology production team." Wang Zhiou remembers that in the years just after graduating from college, his team went out to talk about projects, and always had to "match" a "foreigner" to appear professionally convincing. And this time, he hopes to show the world China's young strength.
After the last rehearsal, director Zhang Yimou and Wang Zhiou's team took a group photo
"The water of the Yellow River rises from heaven", when the surging and magnificent flowing in Li Bai's poems flow above the bird's nest, it becomes a moving image in the eyes of the audience. This presentation is based on a large number of data reading, Chinese ink painting analysis, with the deepening of research, Wang Zhiou found that all aspects of Chinese culture have a deep foundation. In his heart, science and technology is the latest language of this era, and the use of "technology + art" to tell the Chinese story well can be most accepted by the younger generation. "We still have a long way to go in the future of innovation, and there are still many stories to tell."
Guizhou Daily Tianyan news reporter
Text/ Cao Wen
Photo/Video Deng Gang
Partly provided by respondents
Edited by Hu Lan
Editor: Min Jie, Shi Yuling