Ethos
Ethos is a short film exploring some of our favorite themes: heroism, selflessness, oh and saving the world. This short was developed entirely in-house as a passion project and served as an excellent engine for exploring new technologies, techniques, and software.
Year
2018
Services
3D Modeling, Animation, Sound Design
Industry
Entertainment
Process breakdown
Character animation was a large part of the project from the very start. One of the first items on the punch list was building a rig that would support every pose and movement outlined in our storyboard.
Fantasy UI
We created a set of cohesive iconography designed to convey a sense of hyper-tech, but with a nod to retro styling. 2D elements were animated, combined, glitched, displaced, and in some cases rendered in 3D to represent a gesture-controlled interface.
Particle breakdown : ferrofluid fill
Research & Development
A major part of the project centered on research and development, intentionally exploring unknown techniques and stretching technical limits. Several complex effects were created through experimentation and creative problem-solving.
A particularly difficult shot depicted a strange material that pulls and stretches like magnetic ink as a character’s fingertips move nearby. The particle transformation sequences explored thousands of particles flowing and reorganizing themselves from one surface into another with fluid, organic motion. The large-scale explosion work was designed to feel more volatile and chemical than a traditional fireball, with layered motion, shifting color, and turbulent detail that gave the effect a dynamic, cinematic energy.