"The Wandering Earth 2" and the visual effects company behind it|Dialogue with Xu Jian

A month and a half after its release, the box office of "The Wandering Earth 2" has almost reached 4 billion.

Source: Lighthouse Pro, as of noon on March 9

For Xu Jian and his MORE VFX, both participating in visual effects work as the main force and at the same time having a small share of investment, such participation is "not bad", whether it is participation in the industrialization process of Chinese films or their own commercialization revenues.

The history of MORE VFX can almost become a mirror of the development of Chinese film "heavy industry". Xu Jian loves movies, and his original intention to start MORE is also movies. At the beginning of the company's establishment, MORE's main business was advertising films, and because of his acquaintance with Ning Hao, Xu Jian and his MORE officially entered the film field.

After experiencing the first experience of "The Great Gold Robbery", "The Legend of Wukong" knows that "losing money" also has to try, "The Wandering Earth" released in 2019 is also an important node for MORE, and since then, such as "heavy industry movies" such as "Assassination of a Novelist" and "Walking on the Moon Alone", MORE's participation is also increasing.

In the unprecedented scale of "The Wandering Earth 2" of domestic "visual effects blockbusters", the role played by MORE VFX is no longer an important participant in the first part, but exists as a coordinator in 90% of domestic forces.

Despite this, "domestic visual effects" still faces many difficulties and challenges, talent competition in the game industry, and even the adjustment and development of its own "business model".

On these topics, Poison Eye chatted with Xu Jian last month, and the following is a summary of some of the interviews.

"If you don't make a play, it's quite cost-effective"

Poison Eyes: Although it is not the first time to cooperate with Guo Fan, I still want to know what things you knew to do in the first timeline around the original timeline of "The Wandering Earth 2"?

Xu Jian: I've been talking since the first part.

Because of the success of the first part, Director Guo has been busy with various things throughout 2019. The serious start of the move is actually the first half of 2020, at that time told us a few ideas, such as the air battle at the beginning of the movie, the prototype and even the scale were already there at the beginning; Another thing that was said at the time was to do "de-aging" digital ageing, and then I panicked. (laughs)

Poison Eyes: Because you haven't done it before?

Xu Jian: Yes, at first, it must have been because I hadn't done it. But the director "instigated" us, "to go in the most bullish direction", we also decided to use the Weta scheme at the beginning, the current world's best solution, is "Twin Killer" set of "pure CG to do a person" program, all want to have a huge breakthrough.

Various tests began in 2020, and at the end of the year, I scanned Hua Ge (Andy Lau) and Jing Ge (Wu Jing) once, but found that they could not do it. That set of solutions can be done by others because of the accumulation of 20 years before, starting from "The Lord of the Rings", to the later "Alita" and "Avatar" have been doing these things, and most of the technology is not open to the public, are people's unique secrets.

Although Chinese learn things quickly, it is still unrealistic for you to shorten 20 years to 2 years. Not only have we not tried this in terms of process, but in practice, all departments on site, including lighting and props, have not matured enough to use that mode: even wireless signals will fight with motion capture. Time, money, and manpower don't actually support us to use this solution.

Poison Eyes: In the end, you chose DeepFake's open source solution.

Xu Jian: Yes. To put it simply, the underlying logic of the mobile phone APP that many people use is also the algorithm of DeepFake, through a large number of AI training, such as our maximum iteration of more than 5 million times, and then tell the AI that I took your current posture, with some young image data, 100% restore your youthful appearance.

But the director's needs are not just like this, his needs are different with the development of the times, including makeup and hair, styling, and aesthetics. There must be a difference between "imaginary youth" and "previous images", and if you really move your youth, everyone will feel abrupt. The director's requirement is to see "today's Brother Hua or Brother Jing", but he needs to think about "what it was like when he was young", such a demand artificial intelligence can not do, can only rely on manual.

We paved a large number of artists, contacted the most mature companies in Hollywood to do digital face change, and Marvel changed many of these things for them. There was no problem at first, but as soon as the director's advanced needs were put forward, it was broken, and they didn't look good at all, because most of their company is Westerners, and Westerners have different perceptions of Chinese's appearance, and they are repaired as soon as they are repaired.

Later, we found a company, this company is basically Chinese, we work together, our side like Tu Hengyu, like Zhang Peng's aging is what we do, and their side is mainly responsible for Liu Peiqiang's youth.

Poison Eyes: This has become a cliché, technology is unified, but cultural and cognitive unity is difficult to achieve? Just like when you did "Crazy Alien" before, you want an "underworld", and the other party's first reaction is "Marlon Brando", not the "punks" in our understanding.

The "underworld" in "Crazy Aliens" Big Fly

Xu Jian: Yes, it's just a matter of origin. Even your understanding of people's appearance, this may be deeply derived from the difference in the language environment, and the understanding between Chinese speakers will be similar.

Poison Eyes: Technically, it's much more difficult than many big scenes, but on the one hand, the audience's positive feedback is not obvious, and once there are flaws, it will be very dramatic—will this be a particularly low-cost thing?

Xu Jian: Actually, there is not much room to discuss, because visual effects always serve the characters and the plot. On the one hand, as you said, it may seem that the cost performance is very low, because when it really can't be done, if there is a slight flaw, it will feel uncomfortable, and if it is not solved, it will be a play.

But on the other hand, even if the audience's eyes are attracted by the big scenes of "landslides and cracks", but our industry sinks down and thinks that it is because those face-changing things have been done, there are no big flaws, if you can ensure that everyone does not play, the reverse is actually very cost-effective.

"An upgrade of an industry"

Poison Eyes: There are many important nodes for MORE, which are the breakthroughs brought by this "The Wandering Earth 2"?

Xu Jian: At the internal level of the company, there are upgrades of technical points, and there are also upgrades of the experience of all members, because the amount is too large, we are the general contractor, and then we go all the way to the bottom and finally count a total of 67 subcontractors.

Specifically, I mentioned a few things before, one is to unify the visual effects standard, and the second is how to control the production plan, these two points are actually relatively large in our company, and we have also made a lot of new attempts, such as the data format USD, which is a free data format released by Disney, it is a new thing, and the iteration of the format has a very large impact.

Because many of our tools are written based on the original data format, for example, simply the naming convention is this thing, I want to write the naming convention based on that data format, how many times a department iterates, you are my next department, you come over and take my version of the thing, and so on. Our company's internal process is a lot of self-developed, background inspection tools, after using USD, it is equivalent to basically rewriting these things.

Poison Eyes: It's like a factory iterating the assembly line for one new product after another? Because of the lessons learned before, during the first part of "The Wandering Earth", the director had a very vivid analogy that the visual effects work was chaotic, that is, many documents were called "123", and MORE was not yet "general control" at that time.

Xu Jian: Yes, so there is no way to count the standards of other households. Lao Guo is also a lesson from the last time, so this time I actually told him several times, I said that this amount is too large, it is difficult for our family to coordinate it, he thought for a while and said no, and he has to put it to you, so that he "clicks" a knife, and he doesn't have to face all the problems. (laughs)

Poison eyes: The process and format are all about improving overall efficiency. So the trailer was raised by the audience that there was a defect in the takeoff of the fighter, and the change could be completed on the same day?

Xu Jian: Yes. 90% of "The Wandering Earth 2" is a domestic visual effects company, plus we use the US dollar data format, which is actually equivalent to forcing the entire visual effects industry to upgrade a level, but also adapt while adjusting.

Finally, sitting down is equivalent to bringing the entire partner together to adapt to the latest standard format and complete the upgrade of an entire industry. We are also a bit of a contribution to the industry.

The "upgrade" is not about how beautiful the individual shots are. In fact, we take out a certain lens alone, you said that 2-3 years ago, our companies can actually make it, two years ago can make it, and now we can make it. What is more important is to be able to produce these lenses in batches and quantities.

Poison Eyes: You are all emphasizing this point, such as the most advanced lens in the world, a single lens, it is not a problem to make, it is nothing more than a matter of time, the key is scale and industrialization.

Xu Jian: Yes, this involves several issues. We emphasize film industrialization, but 50% still rely on artists, film industrialization accounts for the other 50%, then this time I think the biggest contribution, in fact, is the amount of this 50% industrialization, at this stage has been played to a relative extreme.

The harmonization of data formats is only one aspect, included in a unified standard, and then operated in the process. Process is that there are two words in our work, one is workflow, the other is dataflow: workflow refers to the sequence of production links, which is a breakthrough; Dataflow is the standard, data handover from different departments and even companies, the handover process is automated instead of manual inspection, which can save a lot of time for artists and can circulate in teams of thousands of people, which is a big breakthrough.

There is also production management, which is also half based on human experience and half by tools, which is also a major breakthrough in this project, otherwise it would be impossible to finish this thing in such a short time. But I think this is due to the fact that starting from "The Legend of Wukong", it basically depends on personal ability, or the ability to summarize, and the ability to produce.

Poison Eyes: I remembered that in "Assassination of a Novelist", Lu Yang would cut films next to your company, because many times it is physical distance that restricts transmission efficiency.

Xu Jian: Yes, it is not needed after this iteration. The file is available on both sides, and after the unified format, the place where there are modified clips will become a code record, and then the two sides will be synchronized. Such technology was available more than two years ago, but it is not as mature and unified as it is now.

"Must be raison d'être"

Poison Eyes: Two years ago, your circle of friends who announced a price increase, including the competition for talents in the game industry, caused a lot of discussion. At that time, you also began to transform, do some investment, produce.

Xu Jian: This hurdle has not actually been taken (laughs). Mainly from the scale of making money is not a volume, the best time of Chinese movies box office 60 billion a year, this may be the amount of a single game. At the production end, the demand for talent just coincides.

Investment actually does not consume much energy within the company, many times the film side also feels that we have cooperated so well, you have this demand we also support it, everyone also knows that our profit margin is too small, it is difficult to maintain healthy development. Because the share is given to whomever it is, works like "Alone on the Moon" and "The Wandering Earth 2" are not worried about someone to vote, but it is just a matter of who to let in, so the first producer let us participate, which is also a trust in us.

Poison Eyes: What are the implications for future strategies?

Xu Jian: I have expressed a point of view in many places, I think that "visual effects company" can hardly be called a business model from the perspective of the company, not to say that it is mature or immature, it should not become a business model, in fact, it is more ideal to have a relatively temporary, project-based state like the art group.

However, the accumulation of some process tools makes us have to operate as a company. So a breakthrough like investing, [investing] in the head project that we're coming to do, is great for us. Because our profit margins are too small, the investment risk we can withstand is relatively small, and in turn, we need to be particularly accurate.

Now it seems that in order to go further, we actually have a lot of things we can, such as most of the people who can really engage in this industry who like to use technical visual images, and they must expand out for this feature, and the core is still their own products.

Poison Eyes: The team has actually been in a relatively stable state in the past two years? Including the overall size of the company, the number of people.

Xu Jian: From the first part of "The Wandering Earth" to the present, the company's personnel scale has not changed much, it is relatively stable, and there is no blind expansion. On the one hand, the market size, the film industry has not been easy in the past two years; On the other hand, we have suffered in this area.

For example, our first contact with the movie was "The Great Gold Robbery", we were a team of 20 people before, with good craftsmanship, and we first cooperated with director Ning Hao on an advertisement, and the cooperation was also good. When the director was doing "The Great Gold Robbery", he said that Lao Xu, you guys are not bad, let's do it together.

The production team of "The Great Gold Robbery"

At that time, it was also very naïve, I felt that we could do the technical points of each visual effect lens in the analysis, and there was no problem, then simply think that I would add more people, the company expanded from less than 20 people to 80 people, and it turned out that the process, allocation, and feedback of 80 people were different. We didn't have the tools at the time, so we used Excel, and then we messed up and the project was lost.

So the crew of "The Wandering Earth 2" also encountered problems this time, the first part encountered some difficulties, and felt that we solved those difficulties, but in fact, the size of the crew was not so large at that time. Many times the team is already like corporate behavior, I am in the group the whole time, at most more than 2,000 people in the group, and then you think about how to operate a company with more than 2,000 people, you need some standardized processes.

Poison Eyes: It's not a VFX issue anymore, it's the same for the film industry as a whole?

Xu Jian: Yes, our crew lacks this thing, and has not made this, and in the past, it may have been known by one or two hundred people. By the time of the first "The Wandering Earth", the scale was a little bigger, but also, when you get to a few thousand people, there may be 10 or 8 scenes at the same time, and various changes occur every day, including various time and personnel problems.

From the perspective of running a company, this truth is easy to understand, but many times it is understood after practice. In "The Great Gold Robbery", I simply thought that if the current number of people could do one-fifth, just increase the number of people working to five-fifths and invest 100%, but this is not the case.

Poison Eyes: This is actually the feeling that we keep practicing, and the pony crosses the river?

Xu Jian: Practice, this is the truth that has always been said that "practice produces true knowledge". You have to have actual project operation with it to realize this line and this can't, and I should do it. But without a project to support is on paper, even if you use it, you will find that there will be various problems in the actual project.

It's not that you're playing with a technique and playing with an effect. When you face the director, face the director, or the material environment that the live shooting gives you, you will have a lot of changes, and you can really master it.

Poison Eyes: Just mentioned Ning Hao, plus Guo Fan, Lu Yang, Rao Xiaozhi and the gang, MORE can also be regarded as growing up with this generation of directors, in the process of cooperation, how to practice and cooperate with different styles?

Xu Jian: In fact, in essence, they are not so different, the difference is also the difference in artistic creation style, so I actually see more of what they have in common, the difference is only in the artistic style, they are all competing, if this can't be knocked out, it's not that the ideas he wants are all with you to the end.

Poison Eyes: At the end of the day, you guys are a little tired (laughs).

Xu Jian: No, when you find that the "this thing is right" created, in fact, the process is quite happy. Up to now, there is no problem with the technical energy carried by this visual effects team to meet their needs, and what everyone adjusts is the understanding of a picture story, the understanding of emotions, and there is a collision on this.

Poison Eyes: Speaking of a bigger point, the development of the industry is actually a bit similar to the rhythm of our country's economic development, that is, it takes a short time to do what others do for a long time, and the rest of the run-in, in fact, is precisely our Chinese visual effects company compared with Western visual effects companies, the importance of "this thing has to be done by us" is placed here, in fact, it is more about a certain emotion?

Xu Jian: Because visual effects are only one of the small links of the movie, there are so many links in the whole movie, and Chinese films have been going on for more than a hundred years, and the whole set of things from pre-creation to production and shooting to post-production actually has some characteristics.

Some of our leading Internet companies, such as Ali, were not so big at the beginning, precisely because they found a suitable model for this soil and developed step by step. We also grow on this soil, we have many reasons to exist, and our survival and development are in line with these characteristics and this system.