Tata Elxsi Ltd, today announced it has been nominated by Hollywood-based Visual Effects Society (VES) for delivering outstanding animation in “Roadside Romeo”, India ’s pioneering CGI animated theatrical contemporary entertainment movie. It has been nominated in the category of “Outstanding Animation in an Animated Motion Picture” and will compete with “Bolt” (Walt Disney Pictures), “Kung Fu Panda” (DreamWorks Animation), “Wall-E” (Disney-Pixar), and “Waltz With Bashir” (Sony Pictures Classics).
The Visual Effects Society, with more than 1,800 members in 17 countries, is the entertainment industry's only organization representing the full breadth of visual effects practitioners including artists, technologists, studio leaders, supervisors and producers in all areas of entertainment from film, television and commercials to music videos and games. The 7th Annual VES Awards will be presented on Saturday, February 21 in Los Angeles .
A co-production of Walt Disney Pictures and India ’s Yash Raj Films, “Roadside Romeo”, created by Tata Elxsi Ltd’s Visual Computing Labs (VCL) studios in Mumbai, was released globally in the Hindi language, with English subtitles, in October, 2008. Earlier this month, “Roadside Romeo” was named “Best Animated Film” at the 15th Annual Star Screen Awards in Mumbai.
“Roadside Romeo” is considered to be India ’s first purely-entertainment animated theatrical motion picture, including eight original songs and five fully-choreographed ‘Bollywood’ musical numbers. This film departs significantly from the previous crop of animation films in India , in that it is a fully 3D animation movie, and follows a classic Bollywood formula as compared to the scores of 2D animated films based on mythology. Tata Elxsi - VCL’s lead creative team on “Roadside Romeo,” individually named by the VES, includes Pankaj Khandpur - Creative Director and Head of Production, Sherry Bharda - Creative Supervisor; Shrirang Sathaye - Animation Director, and Suhael Merchant - Animation Director.
“This is indeed a proud moment for us and a great achievement for the Indian animation industry. Roadside Romeo is an innovation because it exhibits and brings together the intricate technological detailing that goes into making a detailed 3D film. Indian animation has truly come a long way and we are happy that through this movie we have been able to raise the bar on the quality of animation in India ”, said Mr. Pankaj Khandpur, Creative Director, VCL, Tata Elxsi Ltd.
Detailing the production process, Mr. Khandpur said, “Our VCL team got involved in the creative process right from the beginning. When Jugal Hansraj, the director of the movie shared with us the script, we began conceptualizing each individual character and their environments and we began to draw them, the old fashioned way, using pencil and paper. This process lasted three months. Once this stage was completed, we began storyboarding the film, illustrating each and every scene throughout the film. This was followed by the animatics’ process --- our first look at how all characters will move and interact with each other. The animation pre-production process took about 4 months, eventually overlapping the start of actual production.”
“For the full-blown production,” Mr. Khandpur further explained, “VCL had an entirely in-house crew averaging 120 artists who worked on Roadside Romeo for over 15 months. The VCL team included modelers, riggers, animators, lighters and compositors, supported by texture artists, render wranglers and a core team of technical programmers. At the peak, we had a 170 member team working on this project. We have earned this nomination though the quality of our work, and yet the production costs of Roadside Romeo was a fraction of the production costs for major Hollywood CGI animated films. ”
In addition to animating Roadside Romeo, Tata Elxsi Ltd’s VCL division --- now considered India’s preeminent motion picture visual effects studio has created special effects for many significant films in like “Rab ne Bana di Jodi, “Jodhaa Akbar, ” “Taare Zameen Par” (India’s official Entry to the Oscars), “Rang De Basanti, ” “Dhoom 2” and many more.VCL has also worked with other leading US entertainment companies including Sony Pictures Imageworks, Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), Lionsgate, Mike Young Productions, MGM, STARZ/Film Roman, and others.
