Aug 13, 2018

Exclusive: DreamWorks Directors on the Making of "Bilby" and the Studio's New Shorts Program

In addition to working on feature films, several animation studios have been getting into short animation for several years, both as a platform for new directors to gain experience and to test new animation tools and techniques in smaller productions.

DreamWorks Animation announced last year that it would launch a short film program. One of the first films to be completed from several pitches is "Bilby," directed by Pierre Perifel, Liron Topaz, and JP Sanz. The film grew out of Tim Minchin's film "Larrikins," the story of an Australian marsupial who meets a chick in the dangerous outback. It also incorporates the idea that everything in Australia is out to kill you.

Cartoon Brew will discuss how "Bilby," which just won the Jury Prize at the SIGGRAPH 2018 Computer Animation Festival, was created, how DreamWorks' shorts program operates, and how the animator-to We were able to speak with all three filmmakers about how the program helped them become directors. The studio also shared exclusive behind-the-scenes artwork and clips from the shorts with Cartoon Brew.

Cartoon Brew: How did this short film from Larrikins come about? It started with Chris DeFaria. One of the first things he did was to organize this short film program. And with "Larrikins," it was the first time the three of us had worked together on the same program. So I remember that as soon as we got the green light, Liron came running up to us and asked us to pitch him something.

Pierre Perifel: We were all on the animation team [for Larrikins], JP was the character supervisor for the main characters, I was in charge of animation, and Liron was the lead animator for the film. This was a very exciting time for us, because even though we had a little exposure to it in Larrikins, it was completely new in many respects. First, in terms of storytelling, and obviously, trying to understand and figure out how it worked. Our story is really a feature film-like story condensed into eight minutes.

Was that something you had to sell or did it evolve from Larrikins? Liron Topaz: When the short film program was announced, we saw it as a great opportunity to tell the type of stories we wanted to tell. In fact, I think we were the last pitch to participate in the program. We worked day and night to get it done in time, basically storyboarding everything, editing them, moving the whole thing along, and then we verbally pitched it. [Pierre Perifel:

Pierre Perifel, how did that pitching process actually go? It was one of the first things Chris DeFaria did when he came in. We had a big meeting with the whole studio, and he said, 'One of the things we're going to start is a short film pitching program, and we're going to start literally within two weeks. Before you could pitch to him, you had to pitch to a crew of development executives. Then, when you got to the last 20 films, you had to pitch them to Chris, and he would decide yes or no. It's something he wants to keep doing at the studio.

JP Sands: It was a great experience for us filmmakers because it allowed us to have our own voices in the short films. I think they really let us tell our story. We created our own kind of brain trust and asked for help from directors that we really trusted and respected. We reached out to them and said, 'I'd like you to take a look at this, what do you think? I think it was a little bit organic, and we kind of pulled in who we could when we could. Of course, it is not on the same scale as a feature film. So this short film program gives new artists the opportunity to try new things and explore different departments and roles, including ours as directors.

Director Pierre Perifel: When Liron came to us, he had an idea. What we proposed was almost identical to what you are seeing on the screen. Of course, it was refined, modified, and everything was changed, but I think the core of the story is exactly what Liron proposed to us.

Liron Topaz This is the scene where Bilby and the chick encounter everything that wants to kill you in Australia. Because for that moment to work, every cut, every idea, everything had to be precise.

Other studios' short film programs are sometimes used to experiment with new techniques and new approaches Bilby -

Was that the case with Liron Topaz? Bilby -

Of course it was. This was significant from the beginning. It was the first time that DreamWorks rendered the whole thing using proprietary software called Moonray.

JP Sands: Moonray is a physics-based render engine and the results are stunning. I couldn't have asked for anything better. Everything played and looked great. What I loved about the rendering approach and what the lighting did for us was that they didn't just try to make it super realistic, but they really made the illustrative look we were going for into a believable render.

Liron Topaz: That rendering engine will be used in our future films, so our short film became a testing ground where we ran into every problem imaginable. Well, not every single one.

JP Sans: Another technology is the locomotion system spearheaded by Liron. This is a way for animators to handle moving characters more efficiently, for example, walking or running, whatever the character may be.

Liron Topaz: It was helpful mainly because of the amount of characters we had and the amount of different tasks we had to do.

Pierre Perifel: We also developed a new wind system for grass and fur, a system that allowed us to dust some of the surface details on the ground.

After completing "Bilby," did you discover anything about the supervision process? Because we all work in big studios, and usually when you work in a big studio, you feel like one of many, one of a big production. And all of a sudden you have to steer your idea from the beginning to the final product. I think for all three of us, it ignited a creative fire about telling stories, developing ideas, and developing characters. For me personally, it reminded me of why I got into animation and why I fell in love with the job.

JP Sans: To add to that, for me it was a collaboration. Before I directed, I only thought that when you work with a director, they have all the answers, they know exactly what to do, they know every step of the way. But the collaborative aspect was very humbling. We came to trust everyone around us to express the vision, emotion, and heart we wanted to put on the screen.

Pierre Perifel The last time we actually made a film ourselves was when I was a student. And working on such a big film really trained me well in my craft, as an animator and visual artist. And then you are faced with the job of actually directing something, and you realize that in those 10 years you have learned a lot about directing films that you never thought you would.

"Bilby" and another DreamWorks short, "Bird Karma," directed by William Salazar, both premiered at Annecy 2018.