Katy Perry’s Daisy world of course...
Ever wondered what goes on back-stage at American Idol?
Rewriting the XR rule book
The intricate skills merging of real & virtual props within a live performance in an augmented world took viewers on a mesmerizing journey...
Taking the traditional (original) American Idol set that viewers expect to see and transforming it into a world inspired by the original Vallee Duhamel Daisies lyric video wasn’t short of challenges and innovations every step of the way. To satisfy fans, the final narrative and aesthetics had to remain close to the original video, but also maximize the full range of XR technology to immerse Katy in a unique universe and take her performance to a whole new level of immersion and interaction with on-set elements.
Keeping viewers on the edge of their seats
Incorporating real props such as the yellow chair into live performances throws up many challenges. To achieve seamless transitions from every camera angle and to merge the front and back plates rotating around Katy, we developed a specially designed previz-rig within our software to refine every transition in our XR environment prior to filming. Our skills in crafting shadows and applying just the right amount of texture shading always adds a crucial layer of authenticity to the final look.
Getting into the weeds of reinterpreting Daisies for XR
A technical deep dive into how all the pieces grew together.
A major production priority was keeping our Notch and Cinema4D worlds in sync to allow for more efficient remote collaboration & project merging. The concept that we scripted and filmed in collaboration with XR studios required three artists working simultaneously in Notch on different aspects of the same project - so extensive organization and labeling was key to keeping the creativity flowing.
The seed of the project was building mockups in Cinema 4D based on the original video references. As scenes, simulations and transitions were finalized, they were imported into Notch to save time and money during the final on-set live performance rehearsals.
Another big challenge was optimization. Extensive creative refinement within a short time frame, coupled with the weight of an XR system on media servers required extensive experience to compress key elements and reduce the number of active objects in any given scene without compromising the broadcast WOW.
On a daily basis, all changes were branched and merged into a master file, allowing us to scale up the workflow in new ways increasing creativity & time efficiency.
As well as creating textures using substance designer, animation and modeling was handled through Cinema 4D and then exported to Alembics for playback in Notch.
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
Katy Perry Live at American Idol
