DOUBLE NEGATIVE ZONES IN ON BAGHDAD FOR LATEST GREENGRASS MOVIE

Paul Greengrass's Green Zone is set in the immediate weeks after the cessation of hostilities in Iraq following the allies' invasion. The Double Negative team were required to recreate Baghdad at that time and to provide the vfx required to replicate the "shock and awe" bombing that took place in the early days of the invasion.

Visual Effects Supervisor, Peter Chiang and Visual Effects Producer Matt Plummer, led the project with Dneg's internal Visual Effects Supervisor Charlie Noble and co-CG Supervisors, Julian Foddy and Dan Neal and Line Producer, Tracey Leadbetter. Other key team members were 2D leads, Jolene McCaffrey and Sean Stranks.

The work included recreating Baghdad International Airport, the Republican Palace, Assasin's Gate, Victory Parade, as well as populating the environments with Black Hawks, Chinooks, Humvees, soldiers, trees, plants and much debris and destruction. All these environments were built up in CG using "slithers" of live action to work around.

In a notable sequence involving a helicpotor flyover, the complexity of the camera move meant the entire Green Zone needed to be recreated in 3D with only the peripheries and extreme background using 2.5D methods.

The nature of the shooting style also meant that most of the live action was shot without greenscreen presenting a massive challenge to the tracking and roto teams.

Green Zone opens in the US &UK on March 12th, 2010.

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