The Lion King

MPC collaborated with filmmakers of Disney’s The Lion King to bring the beloved Disney characters back to the big screen in a whole new way.

MPC was involved with the project from its inception when MPC VFX Supervisor Adam Valdez began discussing evolving methodology with Favreau and Disney while they were wrapping up The Jungle Book campaign in October 2016. From there, the vision began to take shape. Favreau wanted to create a new connection to a beloved story through a documentary-style sense of reality and a true representation of Africa. That directive would first take the team to Kenya on location scouting and data capture missions, before moving into virtual production and beyond through final VFX and Animation.

Charged with producing all VFX and Animation for The Lion King, the MPC team delivered a staggering 1490 shots – as well as all 2-D and 3-D renders; 1250 MPC artists, representing more than 30 different nationalities, worked across studios in Los Angeles, London, and Bangalore.

Read more about MPC’s award-winning work here.

Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio

People are sometimes afraid of what they don’t know… Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Guillermo del Toro reinvents the classic tale of the wooden marionette who is magically brought to life in order to mend the heart of a grieving woodcarver named Geppetto. This whimsical, stop-motion film directed by Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson follows the mischievous and disobedient adventures of Pinocchio in his pursuit of a place in the world.

Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio is in select theaters November and on Netflix December 9.

Guardians of the Galaxy

MPC has completed 857 shots for Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy. Led by MPC VFX Supervisor Nicolas Aithadi and Producer Marianne Speight, the team created CG characters, environments, and spacecraft, for the James Gunn-directed production.

MPC artists started with Marvel concepts of Groot, going on to work on developing and refining him to meet Gunn’s vision of the character. Groot needed to have two defining personality traits; firstly that he is gentle and kind but also that he has the capacity to be fierce and aggressive. The challenge was to find both traits and combine them into his final look and animation. . Groot is a highly complicated character who required a high level of complex modeling. He needed to look as rigid as a tree but also flexible enough to animate and give emotion. Each individual branch running through Groot’s body was modeled and rigged individually. MPC’s animation team created a procedural system to automatically add these ‘mechanical’ effects based on the position of the joints.

Textures came from photos of a wide variety of trees at Kew Gardens in London. The texture of wood naturally looks like wrinkles on the skin, so the challenge was to make sure that Groot’s textures looked like they were made of wood, but also to ensure that he didn’t look old. The team spent time looking at different trees and plants to find the right skin texture for Groot. He ultimately became a fusion of different species of trees. Groot’s wood and bark surface textures were enhanced with a variety of mosses and lichen to add detail.

Read more about our work Guardians of the Galaxy here.

Predator

From 20th Century Studios and Director Dan Trachtenberg comes Prey, the next installment in the hugely popular Predator series, and prequel to the iconic first film.

MPC’s global team, led by VFX Supervisor Chris Uyede and VFX Producers Lachlan Christie and Cleo Dessureault delivered a total of 632 shots for the Predator’s return to screens.

The Predator itself was the primary focus of the team. The creature was tackled using a hybrid approach, including practical FX and digital techniques. Working in tandem with Studio ADI, who had fabricated an animatronic suit, MPC created a full CG Predator that was used to augment or replace parts of the suit as well as play as entirely 3D for close-ups on his face or when exaggerated performances were required.

Read more here!

Clifford the Big Red Dog

MPC was entrusted with recreating the iconic large puppy, in Clifford the Big Red Dog.

When Emily discovers her little red puppy named Clifford has grown ten feet overnight, she turns to her eccentric Uncle Casey for help. But when a mad scientist tries to capture the larger-than-life playful pup, it takes the entire neighborhood to hide Clifford as they race across the city.

Asterix & Obelix

Asterix and Obelix are coming back to the big screen, with the help of MPC in Asterix & Obelix: The Middle Kingdom! The Chinese princess Fu Yi arrives at the Gallic village to ask Asterix and Obelix for help after Prince Deng Qin’s coup overthrows the Empress…

This is the third live-action Asterix film for which our Parisian teams have produced the visual effects: Asterix and the Olympic Games (2008) and Asterix and Obelix: God Save Britannia (2012).

Keep an eye out for more exciting projects and iconic characters from MPC, learn more about our upcoming shows over at our filmography, and read part 4 here!