Exopolis created an interesting painterly 3D world for a new TCM promo. The promo is actually a revisioning of an Edward Hopper inspired promo that first aired on TCM 13 years ago.
Maybe I’m jaded from seeing too much CG, but I find this non-realistic 3D treatment so much more approachable than the hyper-real aesthetics often used in CG ads. Kudos to TCM and Exopolis for having the courage and vision to see this through to its full completion.
Here’s a semi-technical blurb from the PR release:
To achieve this dramatic and cinematic 3D world, [Exopolis’ Brien] Holman oversaw a team of designers and animators using a software package consisting of Autodesk 3ds Max for modeling, Adobe After Effects for compositing, and Ambient Design ArtRage 2 to create the oil painting-like effect. Using ArtRage 2, designer Lorin Wood custom painted textures for each scene from which 3D objects were then modeled in 3ds Max. To achieve the stylized painting effect in scenes featuring people, and to give the characters an almost realistic, lifelike quality, several layers of footage from Getty Images were rotoscoped into separate passes of light and shadow. Animator Richie Sandow then treated and composited each layer in After Effects, hand-painting some detail back into each character to create each final “custom-painted” individual.