The scary faces of 'The Spiderwick Chronicles' Video
The scary faces of 'The Spiderwick Chronicles' Video Transcript
[ Music ] ^M00:00:04
>> Why can't I see you?
>> You don't see us -- now you do, but only if we want you to.
>> The movie is basically a fantasy movie. It's about a family that moves out to the Spiderwick Estate.
>> Oh, the house -- yes it's great. They're like the creepy house in the middle of nowhere.
>> Where the kids there they find a book. And the book basically describes all of the mystical creatures in the world around us. They actually gain some information that the evil creatures in the world want to get.
>> Tim Alexander is a visual effects supervisor for Industrial Light and Magic. He's worked on several Harry Potter films and says creating characters for the fantasy genre is increasingly difficult for the sophisticated audience.
>> This is Thimbletack. He basically protects the house and protects the book. He has a lot of dialogue in the film, so we have to be able to -- able to emote and express. And the animators can create these shapes within our new facial system. And we have an interface here where we can actually describe like rage, or angry or repulsion. So, an animator can go in and actually move the face around and then we can save these moments. If we pull these muscles on the face, you see a pull here on the character as well. And we went through Thimbletack and for each of the muscles that a human face would have we designed a muscle for Thimbletack.
>> Once the characters are built, integrating them into the landscape is another challenge.
>> You know if we cut to the shot and you look at it that you can't really pick out where the flower sprites are. They're supposed to completely blend in and then you see them take off and you go, oh wow, there was something in that bush. And that's the kind of the feeling we want to get across to the audience. For Director Mark Walters, whenever you had a choice to make between maybe putting something a little over the top, or blending it in and try to make it feel organic. He always wanted to put the organic blended-in kind of thing. He really wanted it to feel like this is the real world.
>> There's no such thing as goblins.
>> Look through this. ^M00:01:52 [ Sound effects ] ^M00:01:54
>> Wait, wait, don't go out there. They'll see you. Unless -- wait, are you with them or with me. Whose side are you on? State your side.
>> Yours, your side.
>> It's very difficult to make people buy that it could exist and that's what we're trying to do with this film. And I think that that's really where we can push in the future, to really try to make creatures that that people do buy and it doesn't necessarily take you out of the film by making you think, Ah it's okay 'cause it's just a fantasy thing.
>> Give me the book.
>> Tim Alexander tells us that one of his goals in creating this film was to have the audience leave and have the real world blend with the fantasy world. Who knows, maybe those flowers sprites do live in here. I'm Kara Tsuboi, CNET News.com ^M00:02:42 [ Music ]
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