#Dancing mumble penguin how to

George Miller comes from a live-action background, and he’s comfortable directing actors on stage, so he could do take after take quickly. We used some motion capture, predominately for the dancing and dramatic sense when the penguins walk around. Although neither species knows about the other, we see them both.ĭid you use motion capture for the penguins, as on the first film? They have contact with our hero penguins. Will the Krill decides he doesn’t want to be in the krill swarm, so he and his best friend, Bill the Krill, break away from the swarm and end up as two little individuals in the ocean. We have thousands and thousands of krill. But they have a big impact on the biosystem of the world. They are almost at the bottom of the food chain they’re insignificant. And, to animate things as little as krill sounded amazing. There’s a parallel story about the tiny little krill, and their story is so good and so funny.

They’re the reason I wanted to make this movie. Will the Krill and Bill the Krill, voiced by Brad Pitt and Matt Damon.

#Dancing mumble penguin how to

And, we didn’t teach every team how to animate elephant seals, which were all keyframed. Everyone did penguins, but two of the teams became really good at animating krill, so I cast more krill sequences to them. At peak, we had nine teams, but most of the time we had six or seven. I had a number of leads, which is similar to the way I worked at ILM, and divided the work into sequences. Then, I committed to hiring only Australian junior animators. But, just before I started hiring, Animal Logic was finishing Guardians and didn’t have another big show yet, so I was able to pick up a lot of senior and mid-level animators and a couple of leads who probably otherwise would have gone to Canada or the UK. There are companies doing CG, but there aren’t a lot of character animators. I was worried when I first came down here because I knew CG animation wasn’t huge. I had 75 animators at peak from 14 countries, with 32 from Australia. How many animators did you have on your team? I sat with George and looked at what he liked and didn’t like in the first film, and I spent the first year, from April 2009 to April 2010, building an animation team. System to animate crowds of penguins and schools of fish. At bottom: A separate team of animators used motion cycles and a rules-based To perfect and amplify performances captured from dancers for the penguins, and to add facialĮxpressions. We spoke to Coleman soon after work onĪt top: A team of 75 animators from 14 countries worked at Dr. Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones andĮpisode I – The Phantom Menace) and two BAFTA nominations (for Prior to joining the Happy Feet Two crew, Rob Coleman was an animation director and supervisor at Industrial Light & Magic, where he received two Oscar nominations for best visual effects (for Returning penguin voice actors include Elijah Wood as Mumble and Robin Williams as Ramon and Lovelace. Erik can’t dance, but when he meets the “Mighty Sven,” a puffin that Erik mistakes for a penguin, Erik becomes determined to fly. Mumble, the Emperor Penguin who could dance but not sing, is now married to Gloria they have a son, Erik. In 2009, he hired Rob Coleman to build an animation team and direct the animation for Happy Feet Two, which picks up where the first film left off.

D, in Sydney, Australia, and began preparing for a sequel. Happy Feet’s joyous story caught the imagination of audiences worldwide, and the film went on to win the Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film in 2007.įollowing that win, director George Miller founded his own studio, Dr. An animated feature in which many of the character performances started with motion-capture data? Blasphemy. released the first Happy Feet movie, people wondered what they were thinking down under.