Liam Whitehouse is one of fxphd’s expert professors in effects. An alumni of ILM and Animal Logic, Whitehouse has worked on such films as Transformers: Dark of the Moon and Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole. In his latest course for fxphd, Lighting & Rendering Destruction FX in Houdini & Nuke, Liam covers photoreal lighting for large scale CGI scenes using Autodesk Maya, Side Effects Houdini and The Foundry’s NUKE. We thought we’d find out a little more about Liam and the course.

fxphd: How did you get into visual effects and particularly FX work? What were some of your early projects?

Whitehouse: One of my early projects was filming on location rainforests and other beautiful QLD scenery on a $2500 per day HDCAM F900 in 2006 and then using HDR Images captured on set to integrate photoreal CG robots into the background. This as well as my experience in FX work on Legend of the Guardians gave me the opportunity to go to ILM, as their ‘TD’s’ do both lighting and effects simulations.

fxphd: Can you talk about your time at Animal on Owns of Ga’Hoole? What was some of the particles work you completed?

Whitehouse: At Animal Logic I was mainly specialized in debris simulations. In the fight sequences I would simulate the feathers tearing off the owls as they slashed their swords at each other. Additionally we would simulate debris particles as they impacted with the rocks and scratched the rocks as they attacked. Careful attention was paid to the variation in size and scale of the feathers and their color to match the owls. It was an awesome project to work on.

Above: watch a preview of Liam’s newest course: Lighting & Rendering Destruction FX in Houdini & Nuke.

 

Whitehouse: What was your experience at ILM like for Transformers 3? Can you talk about getting up to speed on their proprietary tools?

fxphd: ILM has a software team which could very well be as large as Autodesk, so their proprietary tools were very advanced and well developed. Everything worked even though it was very cutting edge and experimental. The greatest breakthrough I saw was using Plume, the in house fluid simulation software. It would simulate and render on the GPU’s using the GPU memory and CUDA cores which was almost 100 – 1000 times faster than using CPU based fluids which need to be simulated, cached and then rendered in a three step process which can take weeks for one large simulation. With Plume, the same size sim could be done before lunch. Amazing.

The other stand out feature of ILM was of course the facility and staff which had all the top artists and scientists from around the world, some of which worked on Empire Strikes Back and every movie since. It was an established company with a lot of history and experience beyond just software and computer power. ILM invented a lot of CGI software for movie making and they will invent what comes after 4k CG.

fxphd: Your previous destruction fx course at fxphd was a lot of fun – where are you taking fxphd members with your new course, HOU214?

Whitehouse: I am trying to show students the most realistic ‘real world’ example of large scale effects lighting and compositing as they would be used on a blockbuster movie like Transformers 4 or Avengers: Age of Ultron. The large super detailed scenes, the attention to detail, the different lighting passes, the compositing process, the integration of 3D and composited 2D elements together. It’s as close to the real thing as can be fitted into the classes.

 

Liam’s previous course, Creating Dynamic Destruction FX in Houdini, Maya, & Nuke, is also available to take at fxphd.

 

fxphd: What do you hope they will come out of the course with at the end?

Whitehouse: My hope is that students will be equipped to create their own fx and lighting setup which are virtually identical in quality to feature film rendered action sequences used in the latest action movies. This course is really geared to achieve difficult high end blockbuster vfx shots by unraveling the unseen challenges in rendering engines, memory, motion blur, geometry and compositing to achieve the outcome.

fxphd: How can members make the most of the fxphd experience, do you think?

Whitehouse: Members can make the most of their experience by spending extra time at the end of the course to apply the knowledge in their own scene using more time to fine tune their settings and animation. There will be enough information in this course for them to closely replicate film vfx shots from movies given enough time.

fxphd: What skills and knowledge do you think a good effects TD needs to have?

Whitehouse: Some TD’s at ILM had a Masters in Computer Science and a Masters in Fine Art. While that may seem overkill to some people, it actually makes their job a lot easier, because they have trained in both artistry and science to a high level and can then apply it in any software or hardware environment. I think that Effects TD’s that are good at scripting and developing should spend time at art classes doing sculpture, drawing and photography, while strong artists should do classes in Python, C++, lighting science and other scientific and mathematical areas to strengthen up those weaknesses.

Thanks so much to Liam for participating in our Q&A! You can find out more about Liam’s new course, Lighting & Rendering Destruction FX in Houdini & Nuke, right here.