HBO Max
Vgly S2: A Virtual Concert in a Playable Game
The season finale of an HBO series: a virtual concert where the cast, scanned and digitized, plays inside a working Fortnite-style game.
The challenge
Animate the intro sequences and the full finale: the protagonist and his friends, digitized, perform a virtual concert inside a Fortnite parody inspired by the Travis Scott event. In another episode an actor actually plays the game on screen, so it had to work for real.
How it was made
Body and facial scans of the actors; on-set mocap with match cuts between live-action and virtual shots; the Colonia Guerrero neighborhood captured with Gaussian splatting and integrated into Unreal, with close-up buildings and props modeled traditionally; a "tropicalized" Mexico City barrio dressing (graffiti, buckets saving parking spots, tires, market tents); and a playable game with custom characters.
From actor to game
- 01
Scan
Actors' bodies and faces.
- 02
Rig and mocap
Body and facial capture on set and in post.
- 03
Barrio in splats
Colonia Guerrero in Gaussian splats plus modeled close-ups.
- 04
Game in Unreal
A playable game with realtime VFX.
My part
Mocap operation on set and in post (cleanup, facial capture); worldbuilding of several environments; stylized game VFX in Unreal (crowd, smoke, VDB, cloth, realtime RBD destruction, a mask dissolve); camera animation in some scenes; partial modeling, rigging and grooming.
Realidad's director animated other scenes, with the studio co-directing art on the client's script and cinematography.
Outcome
Aired as the season finale on HBO Max. The series' first season won the Gran Premio de Ficción at the PRODU Awards.
The challenge
Animate the intro sequences and the full finale: the protagonist and his friends, digitized, perform a virtual concert inside a Fortnite parody inspired by the Travis Scott event. In another episode an actor actually plays the game on screen, so it had to work for real.
How it was made
Body and facial scans of the actors; on-set mocap with match cuts between live-action and virtual shots; the Colonia Guerrero neighborhood captured with Gaussian splatting and integrated into Unreal, with close-up buildings and props modeled traditionally; a "tropicalized" Mexico City barrio dressing (graffiti, buckets saving parking spots, tires, market tents); and a playable game with custom characters.
From actor to game
- 01
Scan
Actors' bodies and faces.
- 02
Rig and mocap
Body and facial capture on set and in post.
- 03
Barrio in splats
Colonia Guerrero in Gaussian splats plus modeled close-ups.
- 04
Game in Unreal
A playable game with realtime VFX.
My part
Mocap operation on set and in post (cleanup, facial capture); worldbuilding of several environments; stylized game VFX in Unreal (crowd, smoke, VDB, cloth, realtime RBD destruction, a mask dissolve); camera animation in some scenes; partial modeling, rigging and grooming.
Realidad's director animated other scenes, with the studio co-directing art on the client's script and cinematography.
Outcome
Aired as the season finale on HBO Max. The series' first season won the Gran Premio de Ficción at the PRODU Awards.
Behind the scenes
Stack
Unreal Engine · Gaussian Splatting · Motion capture
Credits
- Series
- Vgly — HBO Max / Warner Bros. Discovery
- Series production
- Exile Studio
- Series director
- Sebastián Sariñana
- VFX & virtual production
- Realidad