Did you know that James Cameron, the award-winning film director, producer and screenwriter, worked as a truck driver and a mechanic before? Moreover, the move to film making was the last thing on his mind. He first wrote the script for his most ambitious project?Avatar, a science fiction epic, which earned $1 billion in its first three weekends?in 1994, and had to then wait for 15 years for computer graphics technology to catch up with him?
It may sound strange to hear such revelations about Cameron as his reputation as a driven perfectionist has become a part of this Hollywood legend. But as he calmly provided glimpses of his little-known secrets at CA World conference in Las Vegas, the audience sat in rapt attention. ?I always considered myself a nerd even before the word was coined. Bringing science fiction closer to reality has been my passion. But thankfully, advances in technology have made the challenge a lot simpler,? he said.
At the end of 2009, Cameron released Avatar, the first big budget action film to be shot in 3D, using revolutionary camera technology the famous director developed himself. Released simulta- neously in IMAX as well as 3D and conventional widescreen and formats, it is already the highest-grossing IMAX film ever. With $2.8 billion in gross ticket sales, Avatar?s box office receipts have exceeded those of every other film ever made, with one exception?Cameron?s Titanic, still the all-time box office champion. But whatever future surprises Cameron has up his sleeve, he has already made motion picture history.
Cameron has always tried to be on the cutting edge of film making. If The Abyss featured the first photo-realistic computer graphics character, the Terminator combined computer graphics and human actors. True Lies pushed the bar even higher with composite technology.
There is no doubt that 3D adds significant value to movie content and Cameron has shown it in Avatar. ?Avatar is the single most complex piece of filmmaking ever made,? said Cameron. ?We had 1,600 shots for a 2.5 hour movie. It?s not with a single computer graphics interface character, like King Kong or Gollum. We had hundreds of photo-realistic computer graphics characters.?
No wonder, the heart of film technology was a digital asset management system created by Microsoft, which can track every cloud and every blade of computer graphics interface grass in the film. ?Now that we?ve achieved it, we discovered computer graphics characters in 3D look more real than in 2D. Your brain is cued, it?s a real thing not a picture and discounting part of image that makes it look fake,? he said.
It may sound astonishing but while Avatar took four years in the making, Cameron literally spent two-long years working on the computer graphics interface and technology. With the digital asset management system, he could at any moment go back and change the shot or the camera angle or any element of a scene. In essence, he edited the film to perfection the entire time. At the end, Avatar contained 60% computer graphics animation featuring characters created using performance capture system, and 40% live action with visual effects imagery filling in the gaps.
Always torn between art and science, Cameron was inspired by the film 2001: A Space Odyssey. Soon, he began to experiment with 16 mm film and photographing model space ships he had built. While the film Star Wars awakened his love of filmmaking, he achieved his first international success with the Terminator. Subsequently, he went on to direct The Abyss, Terminator 2: Judgment Day and True Lies. Typecast as a director of high-testosterone action films, Cameron raised eyebrows by making Titanic as an intimate love story, albeit one with mind-boggling special effects. Titanic broke box office records all over the world and swept the Academy Awards, winning an unprecedented 11 Oscars, including statuettes for Cameron as best director, and for the film as best picture.
Will 3D become the standard format for movies in the future? Yes, according to Cameron, who has declared that all his future movie projects are going to be in 3D. ?This technology can make a good subject great and even make a boring subject interesting.?
That?s not all. Cameron has been able to convince the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to carry a 3D camera on board its next Mars rover, Curiosity, which will be launching next year. Now that?s one 3D movie I wouldn?t want to miss.