Sony - FUTURE PROOF : New Meets Old
A slender Japanese man wearing a porkpie hat, a button up shirt, and a medical mask gazes forward, a film crew surrounding him. He jumps to his feet. As he speaks in Japanese, yellow subtitles appear.
UEDA
“Cut!”
He strides onto a film set. Upbeat music plays. Two red semi-circles appear against a magenta background, white text between them.
ON SCREEN TEXT: New Meets Old
Now Ueda interviews in front of a dark background. A magenta semi-oval with text appears in front of him.
ON SCREEN TEXT: Shinichiro Ueda
Film Director
Yumemi’s Amazing Journey
Director/Writer/Editor
UEDA
“For me, virtual production was a fusion of analog techniques and the latest digital technology.”
Grainy black and white film footage shows three Japanese men backing away from a train as two medics carry a woman on a stretcher onto the platform. One of the men rushes to her side, distraught.
ON SCREEN TEXT: ©2021 Sony Pictures Entertainment (Japan) Inc. All rights reserved.
Footage shows horrific zombies with decaying flesh, and an eldritch fish creature with a gaping mouth lined with spikes, rise up around a hunched woman in an office building. The view pulls back, revealing the woman to be standing in front of a curved screen covering the full wall of a sound stage.
UEDA
“Backgrounds are made with digital computer graphics.”
Two members of the crew stand off to the side holding tree branches and plastic rods.
UEDA
“But we’re also waving tree branches in front of the camera, and actors are pretending to run in place.”
They wave the branches and rods in front of the camera as an actor runs in place in front of a background of a city street. The view cuts to footage of the actor running down the street, shadows flickering across her face.
ON SCREEN TEXT: ©2021 Sony Pictures Entertainment (Japan) Inc. All rights reserved.
UEDA
“This is a type of filmmaking you could never achieve without virtual production.”
Footage shows a man in a fedora driving a motorbike down a desert highway while a woman clutches his waist and nuzzles his neck, both smiling. The view pulls back, revealing them to be on a stationary bike in front of an LED screen creating the impression of speeding down the road. The woman raises her hands in the air with glee. Ueda interviews. Now footage shows three men in cloth coats strolling through a desert toward a silhouetted fourth person, then a waiter in a café props a server in his arm and gazes into her eyes, a platter of cups balanced in his other hand.
ON SCREEN TEXT: ©2021 Sony Pictures Entertainment (Japan) Inc. All rights reserved.
KIKUCHI
“It would have been impossible to shoot in three days on location.”
A woman grabs the shoulders of a bloody and motionless man slumped against a tree, then a man in a black suit jostles the shoulders of a stressed woman on a shadowy street. A young boy with glasses watches in awe as a woman in a vest jumps up and flies through the sky with two digitally animated superheroes. Two men in an industrial warehouse slash past each other with glowing laser swords.
ON SCREEN TEXT: ©2021 Sony Pictures Entertainment (Japan) Inc. All rights reserved.
Kikuchi, a Japanese man with center-parted hair interviews in front of a dark background. A magenta semi-circle with white text appears in front of him.
ON SCREEN TEXT: Yohei Kikuchi
Producer
Sony Pictures Entertainment
KIKUCHI
“So the technology was a good solution for what Director Ueda wanted to do.”
A Japanese man with long hair and a moustache interviews.
ON SCREEN TEXT: Sota Koshino
Virtual Production Director
Yumemi’s Amazing Journey
Sony PCL Inc.
KOSHINO
“Virtual production will be a great tool for directors and…”
The view on the digital screen glides forward through a vending machine into a computer-generated office building.
KOSHINO
“…other creators for bringing imaginary worlds into reality.”
A monitor shows a crew member standing in front of the screen next to the digitally animated fish monster. The view swivels over behind Ueda and three crew members filming the man in front of the screen as the animated zombies rise to life. Ueda interviews.
UEDA
“I think new forms of expression will be possible through virtual production.”
Ueda and his crew gaze over a film camera. Two red semi-circles appear in front of a magenta background. The left side has bold English text with Japanese kanji beneath it, and the right has a Sony logo.
ON SCREEN TEXT: FUTURE PROOF SONY
With a single high-pitched note, a bold Sony logo appears amidst watery blue light.
ON SCREEN TEXT: SONY