Digital skin grafting Technology in compositing - Making of SHIVAJI VFX

#1

Digital Skin Grafting
The technique behind Super Star Rajini’s European complexion in the film ‘Sivaji - The Boss’ (Style Song)

      [b]About the Film:[/b]
    
      [img]http://img159.imageshack.us/img159/6042/image001oe6.gif[/img]
   
    
      The film "[Sivaji The Boss](http://imdb.com/title/tt0479751/)" starring super star rajini is the costliest film made in india to date. Directed by S.Shanker, Cinematography by K.V.Anand, Music by A.R.Rahman, Produced by [A.V.M Productions](http://www.imdb.com/company/co0028536/).
    
       [b]About [Rajini, hero of the film](http://imdb.com/name/nm0707425/):[/b]
    
      He is well known actor worldwide. People call him “Super Star” because of his unique style. He is the 2nd highest paid actor in Asia after Jackie chan.
    
       
     In this film, [director Shanker](http://imdb.com/name/nm0788171/) wanted to change Rajini's wheatish complexion to a white European complexion. As a visual effects company ([Indian Artists](http://www.indianartists.co.in/)) this was a challenging task for us because we guess nobody has executed this type of concept in the world. Thanks to Mr. Shanker for giving us this opportunity to execute his brilliant idea.
    
       [b]The Technique behind Dark skin to fair skin:

[/b]
By dyankayn

      [img]http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/6828/image007nd9.jpg[/img]


   
    
      To begin with, we ([Indian artists](http://www.indianartists.co.in/)) did an in-depth study of the European complexion.  We found that white skin reflects more light and has less shadow when compared to dark skin and is translucent in some areas. Therefore a simple color correction of the hero's skin would not achieve the desired effect.
    
      [img]http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/5259/image005ab4.jpg[/img]

For the shoot a London based young white lady with a fresh complexion and flushed cheeks was chosen and with the help of Cinematographer Mr.K.V.Anand every single shot of the hero was repeated with her because lighting conditions change in every shot. After the final edit all the 630 hero shots and 630 girl shots were scanned in 4K resolution. Each
of the 9000 scanned frames ware rotoscoped to separate the body parts (face, hands, legs etc.). The white lady’s skin was mapped onto the Super Star’s image using Eyeon “Digital Fusion” software. Thus the Super Star got his glowing white complexion. Thank to the “Rising Sun Research” people for providing Cine Space Plug-in to get the perfect
film look

      [[b] Video 01 @ YOUTUBE[/b]](http://youtube.com/watch?v=n7m_d3JEYwM)
   
      [b][Video 02 @ YOUTUBE](http://youtube.com/watch?v=flmXRwPWgJA)
 
 [/b][b][Video 03 @ YOUTUBE](http://youtube.com/watch?v=c54OiSaSvC8)
 
 [/b]There were two difficult aspects in this project.  One was matching the girl's action with the hero's action and the second was matching both of their body proportions during mapping.
    
      [b]Though it sounds simple, the work involved was laborious and painstaking.  Great attention was paid to detail right from the shoot until the final print.  It has taken 25 dedicated CG technicians almost a year to achieve this 6 ½ min. feat
     [/b]
     [[b]watch this movie Running in theatres near you![/b]](http://www.indiaglitz.com/channels/tamil/ticketmain.asp)


     [email]indart@eth.net[/email]
     [www.indianartists.co.in](http://www.indianartists.co.in/)
#2

All credit to you guys for doing this as the final results look very good. But the question has to be asked, would it not have been a lot esier and cheaper to hire a very good makeup artist?

#3

All credit to you guys for doing this as the final results look very good. But the question has to be asked, would it not have been a lot esier and cheaper to hire a very good makeup artist?

Good question. We tried doing this with makeup, it looks like added skin and we got less than 50% effect than compared to what we got with Digital. As we said, fair skin reflects more light and has less shadow when compared to dark skin and is translucent in some areas. First thing we can’t get translucent effect with makeup, second thing you can’t bright the shadow areas like inside ears, nose, neck. And we can’t get bright fresh flesh effect with makeup, like fleshy cheeks, translucent ears, translucent nose…

V.Srinivas M mohan

VFX supervisor

#4

wow digital Makeup better then the real thing who would have guessed … :eek:

#5

All credit to you guys for doing this as the final results look very good. But the question has to be asked, would it not have been a lot esier and cheaper to hire a very good makeup artist?

Good question. We tried doing this with makeup, it looks like added skin and we got less than 50% effect than compared to what we got with Digital. As we said, fair skin reflects more light and has less shadow when compared to dark skin and is translucent in some areas. First thing we can’t get translucent effects with makeup, second thing you can’t bright the shadow areas like inside ears, nose, neck. And we can’t get bright fresh flesh effects with makeup, like fleshy cheeks, translucent ears, translucent nose…

Thank U

V.Srinivas M mohan

VFX supervisor

#6

Never mind the skin graft - whos the babe?:eek:

#7

Never mind the skin graft - whos the babe?

She is from London

#8

All credit to you guys for doing this as the final results look very good. But the question has to be asked, would it not have been a lot esier and cheaper to hire a very good makeup artist?

Good question. We tried doing this with makeup, it looks like added skin and we got less than 50% effect than compared to what we got with Digital. As we said, fair skin reflects more light and has less shadow when compared to dark skin and is translucent in some areas. First thing we can’t get translucent effects with makeup, second thing you can’t bright the shadow areas like inside ears, nose, neck. And we can’t get bright fresh flesh effects with makeup, like fleshy cheeks, translucent ears, translucent nose…

Thank u

V.Srinivas M mohan

VFX supervisor

#9

She is from London

LOL - well thats a big help aint it! Really narrows it down don’t it! You must be from the missing persons department! :rolleyes::smiley:

#10

seems like somebody could write a program to do a lot of this but hats off for having the courage to do it this way!

#11

Do you mean the white bird? She looks a bit surly. The Indian bird though…mmmmMMMMM!!!

#12

Re: Grincc.

Well, I’d have a threesome with both. But the white bird is for me.:bounce:

#13

She’s from India. :wink:

#14

:applause: nice. very nice.

#15

This is a great technical achievement, but I don’t mean to be rude but why was it neccassary? Was his darker skin tone that important to the artwork that it needed to changed, it kinda seems condicending to me.

#16

the original starts to look fake!

#17

[color=black][color=Pink]The[/color][/color][color=black][color=Pink] processes of DIGITAL SKIN GRAFTING [/color][/color]

[ul]
[li]We choose the female reference because of soft skin, fleshy cheeks and absence of shave line. [/li][li]We shot the reference girl for all the shots with same action and lighting condition, since we have to graft the same skin.[/li][li]Each and every frame of the hero’s skin portions was separated with the Rotoscoping process.[/li][li]The speed of the action of the hero and the reference girl was matched. This was a difficult task because no two persons act similarly. [/li][li]We used Grid Wrapping technique to match both the expressions. Again this was difficult as well as time consuming task.[/li][li]We have used nearly 80% of the reference girl skin on to the hero’s skin without loosing his expressions. [/li]
[/ul]V.Srinivas M mohan
Vfx Supervisor

#18

i thinks that will a good film

#19

can’t believe after 6k posts in cgT you would post something like this…

#20

Re: Andy_maxman.

Errr…I’m sorry, but whats your beef with my post? :shrug:

Like other men my age I am sexually volcanic - theres no shame in it! Nothing wrong there, surely? :smiley:

Or did I cause offense about saying I prefered the young white lady in the picture? I personally dont like to identify someone by the colour of their skin alone, but it appeared to be the only way to clear up which of the two ladies I was drooling over.

Seriously, please tell me.:sad: