vEARTH


Based on an idea from my portfolio, the project "vEARTH" was reanimated as part of the "Back to the Past" seminar by Franka Sachse.

A perfect sphere floats in empty space. After a short time, a part of the earth disappears. At the same time, structures of cuboids emerge, reminiscent of a city. After a few moments, the structure collapses again and the sphere recovers. This process is repeated in two other places of the sphere. Then the whole cycle starts again. Getting faster and faster the sphere and its structures look more and more like an engine. Over time, the sphere wears out more and more and has less and less time to recover. At the climax of the animation, it breaks into an asteroid field, which implodes shortly after.


























Design and Animatic
Based on the sketches from the portfolio, a rough 2D animatic was created to get a general feel for the timing. At the same time, styleframes for the look of the animation were made.

In a further step, the animatic was converted into 3D to try out camera positions and refine the timing.


Animation
Based on the 3D animatic, it was now time to animate. The rig of the sphere is fully automated, so only a handle had to be animated, whose position and rotation control the position and progress of the cycle of the sphere.

Once the animation was complete, all that was left to do was light the scene and send the individual shots to render.

In total, about 3600 images were rendered. With an average render time of 5 minutes per image, this means 300 hours of pure render time. Due to human and rendering errors, this time can easily be doubled again.


Rendering & Compositing
In total, about 3600 images were rendered. With an average render time of 5 minutes per image, this means 300 hours of pure render time. Due to human and rendering errors, this time can easily be doubled again.

In the final step, the rendered image was reworked in compositing.


Music
An essential part of the film is the music composed by Anton Severin, especially for this film. With it's mix of orchestral and electronic score, it perfectly captures the atmosphere of the film while emphasizing its minimalist and futuristic look.

When Anton Severin was asked to join the project, he was on board immediately and wrote a beautiful piece of music that evokes memories of Ludwig Göransson's "Mandalorian" or Hans Zimmer's "Dune" soundtrack.