A Long Time Ago…

Motion Capture has been around for decades, with Disney using rotoscope animation for its features. This involved tracing over the individual frames of a live-action performance. While it’s hard to know exactly where it was first used, it arguably became popularised with the original Mortal Kombat game. It wasn’t actually the motion capture we’re familiar with today, the actors were actually in costume. They performed the moves and were then “digitized” into the game, with the movements translated into animation as individual frames. That’s why the character models for the original game look so good because they’re real people!

It quickly arrived in films too, with Batman Forever notably using a “digital stunt double” for several shots. The video game adaptation used similar technology to animate its characters. But as usual, George Lucas was the one took things to a whole new level. 1999 saw the release of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Lucas had to wait for technology to be at a stage for him to complete his prequel trilogy and a large part of that was Jar Jar. The clumsy alien was played by Ahmed Best who is from a physical percussion group background, and was originally only hired for motion capture, before also voicing the character. Although the character was met with negative reception, it remains an important step forward for filmmaking

Apes. Together. Strong.

Around the same time, WETA Digital were working on bringing Gollum to life for Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy. After Andy Serkis’ impressive physical performance, and casting as Smeagol, the original model for the character was changed, to resemble Serkis more. The original model can be seen during the first film. Gollum’s scenes were filmed twice, once with Serkis, and once without. Serkis didn’t actually wear anything we would recognise today for the performance, instead wearing a simple white leotard. They were able to render a (unfinished) model in real-time, to help visualise. Many of the techniques (as well as Serkis) used for Gollum would later be applied to Jackson’s version of King Kong and would be developed further for Matt Reeves’ Planet of the Apes prequel trilogy. Serkis used his influence to found The Imaginarium Studios, a performance capture facility, which recently relocated to Pinewood

Welcome to Pandora

James Cameron took things to the next level with his smash hit Avatar, using motion capture technology to bring to life the alien Na’vi, this time having a camera focused on the actor’s face, as well as whatever cameras are capturing the scene. This technique allows the animators to be able to directly translate the actor’s performance onto the digital character, rather than just as a reference footage. This is the technique commonly used today, and it’s only getting better. Being used to bring to life creatures like the Hulk and Smaug the Dragon, as well as in video games to create more realistic animations and performances, it makes sense why there are so many calls for mocap performances to be recognised at the Oscars.

Also Read: The Many Faces Of Andy Serkis

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Serkis began his career with a series of small roles in series like “The New Statesman” before taking the lead role in “Streetwise”, a drama about bicycle couriers in London. Several other roles followed, including a role as Bill Sykes in a mini-series adaptation of “Oliver Twist”. However, a call from his agent during this time would lead him to perhaps his most iconic role- Gollum in Peter Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” Trilogy.

Gollum was always intended to be a digital character, but it’s hard to argue the character would become as iconic as it has without Serkis behind the mo-cap. Inspired by his cat coughing up a furball, he not only created a distinctive voice that people are still doing impressions of over 10 years later, but also pioneered motion capture as one of the first fully CGI characters in film. Although not the first (Ahmed Best as the infamous Jar Jar Binks in “Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace” has that honour), Serkis played Gollum as much less humanoid and more like an animal, something that would become a trademark for his career as it progressed.

Origin of Mocap

While Motion Capture is often associated with the likes of Gollum, it’s origins can actually be tracedall the way back to 1915. When animator Max Fleischer, who worked on “Betty Boop” and “Popeye”, invented rotoscoping. Rotoscoping involves having an actor perform and then tracing their movements, frame by frame. This makes characters move more fluidly. In the ’60s, this progressed, with simple computers able to track movements.

As technology advanced and computers got faster, this process took less time. More and more industries started using the technology, with it being very useful in medical and sports sciences, and the gaming industry is also making huge advances, able to capture and render movements in real time.

Rise of the Motion Captured Apes

After wrapping up his role of Gollum, Serkis had a few other roles, including a Simpson’s cameo. He teamed up with Peter Jackson again in 2005 to play the title role in his King Kong adaptation. Serkis had originally planned for his mo cap performance to be a one-off, but changed his mind when offered the part of Kong.

Of course, Kong wouldn’t be the only ape Serkis would play, after some more human roles, including Nikola Tesla’s assistant in “The Prestige” and voicing a rat. In 2011, he began his role as Caesar, in “Rise of the Planet of the Apes”, a role he would return to in two sequels, leading an army of mo-cap actors turned apes and even earning talk of an Oscar nomination.

Imaginarium

Serkis continued his mo-cap roles, reprising Gollum for the first instalment of “The Hobbit” trilogy and serving as second unit director for the series. He also starred as Captain Haddock in “The Adventures of Tintin”, which was fully motion captured and animated. And went on to play the mysterious Supreme Leader Snoke in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” and “The Last Jedi”. He’s even added the Marvel franchise to his increasing list of film credits, having had a small role in “Avengers: Age of Ultron”, which was expanded in “Black Panther”.

In 2011, he opened “The Imaginarium” a production company with a base in London, equipped with a motion capture studio. Through this, he has helped work on the motion capture for several of his films, as well as working on several video games. His directorial debut, “Breathe” was also produced by the studio.

Following on from “Breathe”, Serkis decided to use his knowledge of motion capture to direct “Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle”, a different interpretation of “The Jungle Book” featuring more “artistic license” on the animals, who were all created using performance capture. The goal was less realism but have more expression and character to the creatures

Following on from this, Serkis is planning to adapt George Orwell’s “Animal Farm” in a similar style to “Mowgli” as well as set to reprise his role as Captain Haddock in the rumoured “Tintin” sequels. His work with Imaginarium will also continue, and motion capture performances will only improve, as technology gets better and the process becomes more streamlined. It’s only a matter of time before the next big innovation.

And maybe, Andy Serkis will finally earn that Oscar he deserves…

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