Responding to the director’s brief, Animal Logic Executive Producer Zareh Nalbandian harnessed Animal Logic’s film and TVC resources to maximise the impact of the live action. Describing the convergence of film and TVC values on the project, Nalbandian says “Proyas’ commercials and other TVCs at this level are more like short films.  Although they advertise a product, it’s ultimately their ability to entertain that captures the audience’s imagination”.

Familiar with Proyas’ style and artistic vision, the Animal Logic team had the director’s trust from the outset. According to VFX Supervisor Hugh Seville, Proyas’ values for the production were clear very early on. “By the end of the third shoot day it was obvious that we weren’t making a 60-second TVC for cinema release; we were actually making a small film which happened to be a commercial.  Alex has a very accurate eye and he’s extremely effects savvy which helped us a lot – he knew exactly what he wanted throughout”.

Luke Hetherington, 3D Supervisor, says Animal Logic’s 3D team created environments and effects that keep to the spirit of the game but take the experience to a much higher level.  "We recreated environments from the game, but on a much grander and dramatic scale. Placing the live action character into these completely digital worlds, we used lighting and atmosphere to define distance and space,” he says. One of these is the ‘ice lobby’ for which the team used game reference material before recreating a similar version in 3D. This version was larger in scale and more detailed so that it could fit more closely with the filmic technique.

The live action and CG elements were completed in just three weeks by the feature film scale team of animators and compositors who worked with a unique combination of film and commercial production facilities. “Proyas was extremely busy working on many different elements involved on the job”, explains Hetherington. “We just got on with the job we had to do, turning around the 60-second spot at film res inside the deadline we had. There was real trust in terms of the confidence Alex (Proyas) has that we do quality work”.

With a release date of November 8 in cinemas internationally, Metroid Prime is reported to be one of the biggest releases on the Nintendo game roster for this year. In the commercial created for both cinema and television, game lovers will see the resurrection of bounty hunter Samus Aran in an action packed 60 shot in 60-second narrative.

Metroid 'Prime'
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