VFX artists work in a paradox. On most film and television productions, their contributions are expected to be both impressive and invisible. Complete photorealism is the goal for many visual effects studios: If audiences can’t tell the difference between real and CG, the effects team is considered successful.
For example, we regularly show how to create a photorealistic 3D scene for film and game development, using the best 3D modelling software, but rarely share how to make the CG shots a part of the film's many gags and in-jokes.
Article continues below01. Treat being funny as part of the creative workflow
The first piece of advice Menéndez offers to anyone delivering slapstick comedy is to treat being funny as a key part of the VFX workflow. That means taking the initiative to find the most hilarious approach to each scene, even if it involves some experimentation.
“PFX did a lot of crowd work for The Naked Gun, including many different crowd-based fighting scenes,” he explains. “We decided to do mocap sessions to help us animate these scenes, and used our phones to record ourselves acting out the funniest, most bizarre fights we could. It was quite fun, and also ultimately useful, as the client liked many of them, which meant they made it to the final animation.”
02. Be open to changing techniques
In addition to taking more initiative, Menéndez explains that it’s also crucial for teams to be open to change. This was especially crucial when PFX was working on a sequence in which Liam Neeson interacted with an owl.
At first, the team developed a full CG owl. This was a complex process involving a feather system done in Yeti, and a sim and render in Houdini. There was, however, also an animatronic owl on set that could be used for the same sequence.
“The first time we saw the blue screen of the puppet, we thought that’s it, we definitely have to do all CGI,” Menéndez continues. “However, the final result proved that the puppet, even while looking pretty robotic and fake, was way funnier than our photorealistic owl. That more unrealistic look was exactly what a comedy of this kind required. We ended up cleaning up the wires on the animatronic owl and comping it to the BG plates to do what the story needed. We were then able to use our CG owl in other shots.”
03. Trust the process
Unlike more traditional photoreal VFX, working on comedy VFX sometimes involves delivering scenes that initially seem too strange to execute. For Menéndez, many of the fighting scenes on The Naked Gun were perfect examples: the film sees Liam Neeson’s character, Frank, do everything from killing someone with a lollypop to pulling off a guy's arms and beating him with them.
“That means that as a VFX team, you need to learn to trust the process,” Menéndez reveals. “On The Naked Gun, we needed to do that for a particular fighting scene that involved Liam Neeson’s character, Frank, kicking a gun clip into someone’s tooth and seeing that tooth break off to fly back into the gun as a bullet.”
“At first, it was hard to explain what we needed to do to our artists because it was a strange scene to visualise. But when we opened our minds and put ourselves in the mood of the film, it made all the difference. It was like being in a river and trying to go against the current; once you flow with the current, you’ll be more effective. Animators started to suggest different curves for the gun clips, or using a funnier-looking tooth model, and that was great for the final result.”
04. Make dailies fun
“We made sure our dailies on The Naked Gun were as fun as the film, which brought so much positive energy to the team and had an impact on the final result,” Menéndez continues. He explains that dailies were frequently used as a jumping-off point for artists to explore ways to make scenes even funnier.
“The team had free rein for creativity, and that freedom came from the client side too; our client-side VFX Supervisor and Producer, Ashley Bettini, knew exactly what she wanted, but also gave me the space to propose new ideas,” he adds. “That’s why I enjoyed this project so much, as I consider myself a bit of a joker and the whole film really helped me push that with the whole PFX team.”
05. Remember: physics isn’t as important as the joke
According to Menéndez, tweaking physics to ensure VFX serve the story is crucial to making scenes as funny as possible. While working on The Naked Gun, the PFX team did this for a nighttime fight scene in which Frank kicked his gun clips against enemy heads. If the clips travelled as fast as they would with real-world physics, however, their speed and size would make them almost invisible.
“We decided to cheat the physics by reducing the motion blur on the 3D renders,” says Menéndez. “While it wasn’t fully accurate, it meant the clips would be visible enough to really land the joke in the scene.”
06. Work closely with the production team
The final tip Menéndez has for VFX artists working on comedies is to collaborate closely with the production team so that visual effects are fully aligned with the script. “Many of The Naked Gun’s VFX shots had been well-prepped on set, which made our life way easier,” he reveals.
Adding: “There was a shot where the villain takes a rifle out from the back of Pamela Anderson’s character, Beth Davenport’s head, almost as if it came from inside of it. It sounds bizarre, but we had access to several different blue screen takes to help us achieve the desired look. Without the proper work done on set, that shot would have been a nightmare.”
The same thing happened for a scene where Frank kicks off the head of a foe that’s riding an owl. “We had all the background plates and the rider on a blue screen, as well as Frank’s kicking action. We then replaced the head for a CGI version,” Menéndez concludes. “Because all the prep work had been done on set, we were able to get the head replaced faster, leaving us with more time to play with the speed and the animation to make it as bizarre - and funny - as possible.”
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