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Archive notice: This article was originally published on March 26, 2014. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
This much can be revealed: One of the training centres that made it into the selection of the best VFX and animation schools in DP issue 03/14 is the Georg Simon Ohm University of Applied Sciences in Nuremberg. Kathrin Hawelka from the Ohm University wrote us this making-of for the “Durchgebrannt” project. The “Durchgebrannt” team consisted of Michael Haas, Thomas Schienagel, Simon Scharf, Stefan J. Wühr and Sebastian Franz.
Don’t we all miss them a little, the classic light bulb? Two students from the Georg Simon Ohm University of Applied Sciences in Nuremberg were so concerned about the changes in the lighting industry that they gave the light bulb a key role in their animated short film. In the student project “Durchgebrannt”, the light bulb Kevin and his friend, the moth Frank, set off to realise Kevin’s long-awaited dream at a funfair. The short film “Durchgebrannt” was produced by the two film and animation students Thomas Schienagel and Michael Haas as part of a semester project at the Georg Simon Ohm University of Applied Sciences. The short film has already been shown at several festivals in 2011 and has won several awards. For the project, the two students used Maya in conjunction with Mental Ray for the 3D workflow and Softimage for support. After Effects was used for the 2D work.
The idea
EC Regulation No. 244/2009 gave us the idea for the short film “Durchgebrannt”. Not so long ago, the ban on the classic light bulb was introduced in the EU and the good old light bulb is now being phased out. Inspired by this topical issue, the two students developed the idea for their short film about an animated light bulb and their big dream.
The story
The fully animated short film tells a 9:30 minute story about a light bulb called Kevin, who hangs from a ceiling and is occasionally visited by his friend, the old moth Frank. One day, the owner of the house decides to replace all his light bulbs with energy-saving bulbs. The two of them then set out to realise Kevin’s long-awaited dream: To one day be one of the colourful light bulbs that make the nearby funfair shine brightly with their light. Kevin struggles to wriggle out of his usual place on the ceiling and immediately pays for it with the loss of his luminosity. But despite the extinguished light, the faithful soul Frank follows his friend and stands by his side the whole time. On their escape through the human household, the two face a wide variety of dangers and the two companions experience the adventure of a lifetime. A warm-hearted and at the same time exciting story about a friendship that goes deeper than just the superficial luminosity.
Character design
Once the basic outline of the plot had been finalised, the team developed all the characters involved. Starting with a suitable name and outward appearance, through to features and special characteristics, a unique life story was developed for each character. The descriptions developed went far beyond what is ultimately seen in the film. This process was nevertheless a necessary step, as it very quickly became apparent that the more precisely the character’s characteristics were worked out, the better the two students were able to empathise with the character and realise them. The extensive creation of fully thought-out film characters took a lot of time, but was still great fun. Kevin the light bulb presented a major challenge: How can you breathe life into a technical, rigid object and give it a personality? Kevin is portrayed as endearing and naive, somewhat inexperienced, but nevertheless curious, and so he bravely sets off on the run from the owner of the house. Initially, the plan was not to show the owner of the house in the film, as it was very important to the two students to separate the story of the light bulb with his flitting friend from the real human world. Later, however, he was given a very low-key supporting role to support the understanding of the plot.
Sets
Parallel to the development of the characters, Thomas and Michael designed a large number of sets in which close-up shots with lots of detail and super-total shots had to be possible. In each set, many ordinary and very contemporary everyday objects and household appliances were used, giving them a special effect from the perspective of the little characters. The locations within the house pick up on the theme of upheaval, showing how the old is replaced with the new as part of a renovation. When designing the set, care had to be taken to ensure that the number of polygons remained within the performant range, which could be guaranteed by using proxy objects, among other things. The use of referenced elements proved to be very practical. On the one hand, both students were able to work on the sets in parallel and on the other hand, all changes were automatically updated in all scenes.
Preproduction
Once the sets were finalised, the team integrated all the characters and created an initial 3D animatic, which was shown to a test audience. As a result of the screening, some passages still had to be revised as they were not yet fully comprehensible. At the end of the pre-visualisation phase, a precise division of the shots into acts and scenes was created in order to keep track of the large number of shots during production with the help of a project plan. From this point on, realisation could begin immediately. The team created the majority of the 3D production in Maya, with Softimage being used as a supporting tool.
Rigging and animation
During the development phase, it turned out that Kevin was not only a speciality in the design phase, but also that rigging the light bulb turned out to be a very special challenge. Thanks to his anatomy, he had to maintain the exciting combination of both technical and organic features in the animation. Maya’s hair system found an unusual use in the cable of the light bulb, which simulated a natural movement and allowed manual intervention at any time. During the animation process, the two students worked with dynamic simulations in some places in advance in order to use them as a reference for the subsequent animation work. The fact that Kevin falls down the stairs so lightly and realistically at the end is thanks to his simulation dummy. In the further course of production, expressions were used in many places to simplify the animation processes, for example the flapping of the moth’s wings was defined using a sine function.
Look and shading
Just as with the development of the characters, the team also put a lot of love into the design and realisation of the look. The sets were provided with countless small details. Logos on the appliances and small notes are intended to give the whole environment a high level of detail. As the film flat is currently being renovated, the shading of the individual objects had to be adapted accordingly. Dirt and signs of use were essential to create a credible scenario. The materiality of an object was often resolved using procedural shaders. This was very practical, as it spared the students the often time-consuming unwinding of an object for a correct UV layout.
Light
The only light source that came into question was natural daylight. Apart from the story-relevant light sources, such as Kevin and the funfair, any other artificial light would have raised unnecessary questions. Other lamps or lights within the household had to be completely omitted. The renderer used was Mental Ray with its integrated Physical Sun&Sky system, which in combination with Final Gathering (FG) created the indirect lighting. FG maps were created for the backgrounds in problematic settings in order to keep the rendering time to a minimum and prevent the typical FG flickering. In addition, the students used ray-traced shadows throughout, which produced a much more realistic result. They were also necessary to make it possible to cast shadows in critical areas, such as through the light bulb glass. So that Kevin can shine brightly in his Ferris wheel at the end of the film, the story takes place towards the evening. The dusky surroundings form the perfect contrast to the glowing light bulbs. The poisonous green LEDs proved to be a major problem with the lighting. Based on the fact that the animation of the numerous LEDs was based on a modified particle system, it quickly became apparent that there was no way to instantiate light sources in Maya. Initial attempts to solve this using the capabilities of Final Gathering, i.e. to emit indirect light from materials, failed due to strong FG flickering in the animation. Only with the help of custom scripts was it possible to extend Maya’s particle system so that lights and LEDs could be used in the crowd simulation.
Rendering
Probably the most exhausting part for the students during the realisation was the rendering. Over 14,000 frames had to be rendered for 9:30 minutes of film, with rendering times on an 8-core computer varying between 3 and 20 minutes per frame. The entire computing power of the Faculty of Design in Nuremberg was mobilised in order to cope with this quantity in a reasonable time. The two students shifted their working hours to the night so that the full computing power could be utilised without restriction.
Compositing
Parallel to rendering, the finished image sequences were fed directly into After Effects for further processing. This had the advantage that sources of error and problems could be viewed and rectified immediately. In the workfl ow, OpenEXR proved to be the most fl exible file format. The ability to use 16 bits of colour information could be used retrospectively to influence the exposure. In addition, it was possible to save a large number of passes within one file. The refraction and reflection of the light bulb glass is a good example of this. Additional passes had to be rendered here to achieve the desired look on the one hand and to get to grips with technical problems on the other. Design elements such as motion blur and depth of field were also outsourced to post-production, which turned out to be the most practical and flexible working method. Volumetric effects, such as dust and haze, were also created in After Effects for the same reason and positioned in the room via camera export from Maya. Lights were amplified and supplemented in order to fine-tune the desired atmosphere. Only Kevin required a little special treatment here too. “Filming” a glowing light bulb as a character without bright spots breaking out or facial expressions becoming unrecognisable is no easy task.
The team
Michael Haas and Thomas Schienagel enlisted the support of Sebastian Franz (title design), Simon Scharf (music) and Stefan J. Wühr (sound design) for the title design, the music and the many sounds and noises in the film. The film music was composed by Simon Scharf for a large symphony orchestra, as is typical for the genre. Due to a lack of availability, the latter naturally had to come from the computer. Cubase and several sample libraries are available for this purpose in the recording studio at the Nuremberg University of Music. The film music works with several leitmotifs for the various characters and scenarios. One speciality was certainly the task of generating an authentic and professional orchestral sound using midi sounds and samples. Only one flautist and six brass players were recorded in real life. Simon Scharf’s fellow students from the Nuremberg University of Music were available for this part.
Sound
The sound design by Stefan J. Wühr also harboured some challenges. It was difficult to find the voices for the two main characters. Moth Frank had to be able to flutter and speak frantically, as he embodies the driving force of the two and always helps Kevin on his way. A shaken bed sheet served as the foley base for the fluttering sound. Pitched and equalised, it was trimmed to a fi nal sound. The insect-like chirping is actually a pitched exotic bird. Kevin should sound rather reserved and cautious. The Foley sound of a light bulb twisted into its socket was used here. Turning it in and out created a cute squeak. For the world below the desk, numerous electronic sound atmospheres were used, such as computer humming, modem signals, etc., to make a supposedly electronic, eerie-looking jungle audible. The host of countless spider-like LEDs had to sound enormous and menacing. Here, the individual steps of the LEDs were doubled and additionally supplemented with stampede (cow herd stamping) in the dramatic scenes. The sound design for “Durchgebrannt” was more complex than initially thought, because the entire mix had to be consistent over its entire length with its multitude of noises and voices.
Outlook
Both students are currently working on their diploma theses, which they will complete in July 2012. With the animation film “Durchgebrannt” they have already made a good start, so we can look forward to their final works with great anticipation. With “Durchgebrannt”, the team has currently achieved great success. Their work was selected by a top-class jury in Berlin for the “Next Generation Short Tiger 2012” short film programme (www.german-fi lms.de). The little light bulb was thus selected from 77 films from 22 universities and 51 other submissions. The programme will celebrate its premiere in Cannes on 20 May, after which it will also be shown in Madrid, Paris, New York and Wiesbaden.
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- Mirja Fürst
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