Laika’s latest stop-motion animated film, Wildwood, combined frame-by-frame animation with visual effects. Director Travis Knight, cinematographer Caleb Deschanel and visual effects Supervisor Steve Emerson shared some of the real-world inspirations that informed their work at Contenders Film Los Angeles.
Deschanel had to plan his shots before the characters of the film were finished. So he did a test shoot with Norman from Laika’s ParaNorman, then found a model of a certain pop star.
“I found this Billie Eilish doll, I ordered it, I brought it into the sets and would play around with the lighting,” Deschanel said.
Based on Colin Meloy’s book, Wildwood is about Prue (voice of Peyton Elizabeth Lee) on a mission to rescue her brother, joined by Curtis (Jacob Tremblay). It concludes with an epic battle.
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“Travis said, ‘This thing is going to escalate and we’re going to do a hellscape,’” Emerson said. “That meant we had shadow, fire, light, atmospherics, all these elements at our disposal that we could use in order to create not only a beautiful, artful frame, but put the audience’s eye where we want them to look, which was at those stop-motion performances.”
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It took Knight 16 years to figure out both how to adapt the book, consolidating and inventing elements, and how to realize the visions described by Meloy and illustrated by Carson Ellis. The battle scene itself was carefully storyboarded because they could not animate anything that would not be used.
“When you’re making a stop-motion movie, you cannot shoot any coverage,” Knight said. “If the angle wasn’t quite right, we need to widen out, you can’t do that. That would take an animator three weeks to reshoot.”
Knight called the final battle “a ballet between the practical and the digital.” For that fiery hellscape Emerson described, Deschanel studied footage of the Kuwait oil fires from the 1992 IMAX film Fires of Kuwait.
“There was all this smoke that was really dark that would cover over in the middle of the day,” Deschanel said. “I had this idea of occasionally sunlight coming through, but then Travis didn’t like that idea and ended up creating this incredible dark space that ended up being better. At the end, I managed to get some sunlight in there.”
Emerson confirmed that even when his team creates effects, they are inspired by the stop-motion model work.
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“There are no digital elements not being informed by practical elements,” Emerson said. “We need the stop-motion filmmakers in order to be able to do this work.”
Knight also jokingly lamented that he was depriving the science world of its technical geniuses.
“These people are incredibly brilliant and they could be curing disease or developing sustainable energy,” Knight joked. “Instead, they’re helping me make a puppet look sad.”
Looking ahead to the future of animation, Knight sees little has changed since Laika began. Both Coraline and Wildwood were a fight to get made.
“It’s getting harder and harder to make anything with consolidation,” Knight said. “Art needs advocacy. It needs champions. That’s what we’re trying to do at the studio. We’re one voice. Others will join us. We have to.”
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Deschanel also added hope for a broader approach to animation for all ages.
“Animation doesn’t just have to be for small children,” Deschanel said. “The possibility for creating wonderful, deep stories are there.”
Check back Monday for the panel video.
