(intro theme music)

(daunting music)

[Narrator] No matter how far you go,

man cannot escape his fate.

(footsteps)

(roar)

Hi, I'm Mike Seymour from fxguide.com for Wired

looking at the tech for the making of the creatures

of Hercules.

In a film called Hercules, you always expect something,

well, amazing feats, mythical creatures.

After all the legends of the Greek gods

are fundamental to our cultural story telling.

In this new film, director Brett Ratner

shows us those mythical creatures

and the truth behind them.

Visual effects house Double Negative

under the direction of overall VFX sup John Bruno,

had to walk the line between man and myth

to bring to life those Herculean legendary 12 labors

but as a series of exaggerated stories.

Now, the problem with making something exaggerated and false

even to the film's own logic,

is that you have to make it still seem

real and believable.

After all, in the film these myths are not meant to be funny

just improbable.

Even though they had to produce three-headed dogs,

giant boars and multi-headed serpents,

the Dneg team had to make these shots seem credible.

The team wanted to explore all of this work

while they were still filming.

The team started by shooting as much as they could

in the original plates,

which sometimes meant having stuntmen run up trees

or immersing The Rock, Dwayne Johnson, in swamps,

or even pulling rubber heads out of water on wires.

With great reference and great POV photography,

the team would then realize these fully digital characters.

(roars)

The giant lion was particularly challenging,

requiring complex fur and hair simulation

that both illustrated the creature's size

and also gave a frightening drama to the shots.

For this Dneg used their Furball tool

developed just a year or so ago.

This is actually the first ever image that it rendered.

Furball has a fully GPU-based solution

that can preview the fur in record time.

Without this tool, the team wouldn't have

been able to move at the pace they did.

For example, this sequence was all but finished,

while first in it was still shooting the film.

The Furball GPU rendering provides exactly the speed

and final image quality that's needed.

And it's used on almost all of the creature shots.

The effects team went back on set

with several creature shots,

including this near final of the lion leaping.

As you can imagine, it's very reassuring for the cast

and the crew alike,

to see shots like this while they are still working.

It gives confidence, and most importantly,

it allows the director time to properly

integrate the shots into the story,

especially when they move into editing.

Gone are the days of judging a film's pace and edit

while only having stand-in stills.

Making VFX actually much more part of a production

and much less of a post/after thought.

But don't forget,

subscribe for more behind the scenes action.

I'm Mike Seymour for Wired.

[Man] Now tell me ...

who are you?

I am Hercules!