Archive notice: This article was originally published on March 23, 2017. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
Square Enix is the game developer of the Final Fantasy series. “Kingsglaive” is part of a multimedia release surrounding the video game “Final Fantasy XV.” The film, which is 115 minutes long in total, takes place parallel to the events of “Final Fantasy XV” and covers the story surrounding King Regis Lucis Caelum CXIII, father of video-game protagonist Noctis. The film opened in Japan last year in July, and in the USA shortly afterwards in August. In German-speaking countries, it appeared directly on Blu-Ray and DVD at the end of September.
Workflow & Software
For the realization of the film, Image Engine received assets as well as body- and facial-motion-capture data from Square Enix so that the look remained closely aligned with that of the game.
Image Engine is no blank CG-destruction slate, but this project set the bar significantly higher again than other projects. For the destruction of the epic cityscape, specific hero buildings placed by the team with Autodesk Maya were exchanged for architecture that was made to explode with rigid body dynamics in Side FX’s Houdini. Deep compositing helped save time with the numerous layers. Lighting was done with Gaffer and rendering with 3Delight.
