What ’ s really impressive are the characters themselves : they ’ re fluid and lifelike , animated with a raw yet graceful physicality . RealtimeUK used motion capture for timing and basic movement , then augmented the animation with keyframing to imbue each hero with their own distinctive style . Meanwhile , video reference was used to bring a sense of emotion to their expressions .
Using technology that works
‘ To Hell & Back ’ spotlights six characters , each immaculately constructed and featured heavily within the large , sprawling environment – and accompanied with a cascade of simulations for water , lava , and more . The trailer is suitably epic , but with that scale came challenges .
“ We wanted everything to feel as close to reality as possible , so we had to develop techniques that would enable everything to fit through the renderer ,” explains James Kirkham , lead artist at RealtimeUK . “ We had to split everything out a lot , as we just couldn ’ t fit it into memory back then . It was a challenge , but a fun one !”
Alongside various optimization techniques , such as chopping up shots to push them through the renderer , Deadline kept the RealtimeUK team ’ s processes in check by giving plenty of statistical feedback .
RealtimeUK were able to monitor the render times and ram usage per job , easily spotting problem files and marking them as bad . Meanwhile , other render jobs can continue in the background , so no time is wasted white our artists optimise problem scenes .
For Kirkham , Deadline ’ s solutions are critical for allowing his team to focus on creativity and deliver to the highest level , without having to worry about the impediments and bottlenecks that are presented by technology . Some render solutions require a server to always be running , which is likely to crash as projects ramp up . Deadline enables unobtrusive reliability .
Previously , RealtimeUK were reliant on a lightweight solution to manage rendering loads . Upon joining the team , Kirkham persuaded his new studio to make the switch – something that changed the game for RealtimeUK .
“ The more jobs we put into Backburner , the more unstable it would become , resulting in all renders failing ,” recalls Matthews . “ This tended to happen at the more crucial end of a project . Backburner had no system to restart itself either , which meant someone was required to monitor jobs around the clock , otherwise we could lose a lot of render time .”
RealtimeUK had to constantly restart the server and manually complete tasks with nodes . Now ,