Douglas Njegovan, Yoram Gross EM. TV Studios

(June 2006)

For thirty-seven years, Sydney-based Yoram Gross-EM.TV (Yoram Gross) has been delighting audiences with outstanding animated fare. Internationally recognized as Australia's leading producer of quality children's and family entertainment, the veteran studio has been using wondertouch particleIllusion software to create a broad spectrum of particle effects on various international television hit series including the company's flagship "Blinky Bill," "Seaside Hotel," "Flipper & Lopaka," and "Tabaluga," among others.

The Yoram Gross production pipeline is predominantly based on the Macintosh platform. particleIllusion 2.0.5 was first adopted into the studio's special effects department in 2001. The latest version of the software, particleIllusion 3.0 for Mac OS X, is presently installed on Mac G5 Dual 2 GHz computers, and is used in conjunction with Adobe After Effects for tracking, matting and compositing with existing animation.

Douglas Njegovan, 3D SFX animator at Yoram Gross and long time user of particleIllusion comments, "As an early particleIllusion beta tester, I had preliminary insight into the development of the product and slowly began to integrate it more and more into our productions. As the creative team started to become more familiar with its capabilities, we have been able to do more CG special effects work in the same or less amount of time. The introduction of particleIllusion 3.0 for the Mac OS X last year was an eagerly anticipated release for our platform of choice, and it has become an indispensable production tool."

Effects work at Yoram Gross consists of a mix that requires creating effects from scratch, adding elements to traditional animated effects to reach the final desired look or simply enhancing an existing 2D effect.

"Our special effects department sits between the compositing and post/editing departments," notes Njegovan. "Typically, the effects process begins when an art director assigns scenes that will involve visual effects shots. Scenes get sent to the compositing department where they undergo normal fix-ups and adjustments. The scenes are then sent to the special effects department for final completion.

"Much of the time, traditional animated layers are not drawn but the whole effect is computer generated. These shots are imported into After Effects where particleIllusion effects are composited together with 2D animation. Other times we have already animated the effect in 2D but it requires final polish. The resulting material is rendered and transferred to our Final Cut Pro editing suites," he says.

Animated particle effects at Yoram Gross range from prominent effects such as water, snow, rain, dust and smoke and all sorts of lighting effects to secondary animation scene fillers such as blowing leaves, floating debris, plant life, mist and clouds. As in any complex CG production Njegovan says the main challenges for effects artists involve marrying different sources into one scene that help convey the story and don't take away viewers attention.

"Being able to match the effects design to our characters and background painting style and making sure that an effect appears seamless in the sequence is something we've been successfully able to do to using particleIllusion and After Effects on a number of projects," adds Njegovan. "We take special care so that the effects do not overpower characters and action but enhance the overall experience. Because the particleIllusion emitter library is so easy to customize with our own source artwork, it genuinely helps us convey the feeling that all imagery comes from the same source," he says. "particleIllusion's robust keyframing tools and ability to import a wide range of image and movie files as a background layers helps us to successfully complete more challenging shots involving camera motion and character tracking."

Njegovan explains that particleIllusion has been in widespread use the past four-and-a-half years on several children's animated television series including, "Seaside Hotel," now going into its second season being co-produced with Yoram Gross' French partner, "Télé Images Kids. It was also used to produce 13, 24-minute episodes based on a collection of children's books called, "Deadly!" Other Yoram Gross programs that have relied on particleIllusion include "Tabaluga," a series in its third season chronicling the adventures of the last dragon left on earth and his adversary an evil snowman, and "Flipper and Lopaka," an action/comedy adventure about Flipper the dolphin and his human friend Lopaka, also in its third season.

"Leveraging particleIllusion on "Tabaluga" allowed us full creative license in developing light and transform elements, snow storm sequences, magical effects, water and light, dust and smoke," says Njegovan. "During season three of "Flipper and Lopaka," more visual effects shots per episode were added as well as the introduction of 3D props composited with 2D animation. With access to particleIllusion's more than 1500 preset emitters there is an endless supply of presets for us to start with and we were able to easily incorporate changes quickly without affecting production schedules."

Yoram-Gross also used particleIllusion during the 2005 holiday season to create a wide range of effects for a "Blinky Bill's White Christmas," a feature length television episode made specifically for Channel 7 Australia; broadcast on Christmas Eve.

"In general, particleIllusion helps us create effects either by complementing 2D animation or during post-production where things become obvious in the final cut," says Njegovan. "In a busy studio like ours where time is short, particleIllusion's speed is a real asset. particle Illusion is not only the fastest particle generator I've ever used, but it offers great versatility and ease of use which allows you to go from effect to effect in just couple of clicks.