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Rahul Venugopal
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Ad Astra Earth Opening Environment Sequence

Last year, I had this great opportunity to contribute to the opening sequence of Jame Gray's epic space journey Ad Astra. As a lead matte painter at Mr.X Montreal, I was responsible for coming up with the look and feel for the whole sequence closely matching with the gritty vision of Gray's cinematic space and organic feel of Hoyte van Hoytema's cinematography.

I worked on nearly 20 shots featuring Earth from different heights when the lead character falls from an 80,000ft tall Antenna. A 32k 360-degree stitch of an area in Ecuador was provided by Visual Effects supervisor Olaf Wendt which served as the base for the whole environment. This was projected in Nuke and used throughout the sequence as a global reference for all the shots. Individual views from this 360 view were rendered out and enhanced then reprojected back as required by later shots in the sequence. I am really happy with the overall results and I hope you guys like it!

This was the opening shot that defined the look and feel of the rest of the sequence. It was uniquely challenging since it was a slow 180 degree camera rotation.

This was the opening shot that defined the look and feel of the rest of the sequence. It was uniquely challenging since it was a slow 180 degree camera rotation.

This was the opening shot that defined the look and feel of the rest of the sequence. It was uniquely challengin since it was a slow 180 degree camera rotation.

This was the opening shot that defined the look and feel of the rest of the sequence. It was uniquely challengin since it was a slow 180 degree camera rotation.

low angle

low angle

This matte painting was a teamwork between Sergei Sarichev and myself. My contribution was mainly on the lower atmosphere and adding the finishing touches to match this matte painting with the rest of the sequence.

This matte painting was a teamwork between Sergei Sarichev and myself. My contribution was mainly on the lower atmosphere and adding the finishing touches to match this matte painting with the rest of the sequence.

This matte painting was a teamwork between Sergei Sarichev and myself. My contribution was mainly on the lower atmosphere and adding the finishing touches to match this matte painting with the rest of the sequence.

This matte painting was a teamwork between Sergei Sarichev and myself. My contribution was mainly on the lower atmosphere and adding the finishing touches to match this matte painting with the rest of the sequence.

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