IA: Which of your works you think left a mark on your client and spectators?

CE: The biggest project we worked on is Delhaize which made us famous in Belgium where it was warmly welcomed. Amnesty International allowed us to put forth our skills in VFX when everybody thought we were just capable of doing 3D animations. Black Night was a cinematographic challenge for us; we worked on it in anamorphic 4K which is completely different from PAL. This project helped us proving ourselves as special effects specialists.Mc Flurry was also an excellent work for us in terms of graphic creation and the multitude of graphical universes. And finally, Michael The Turtle, which helped us win the first price of PIXEL/INA clip sponsored by Imagina.

IA: Can you tell us a bit more about your short “PAf le moustique:?

CE: In 1998 when Maya got finally transposed to the PC after being reserved to the silicon graphics of that period, Jerome and I decided to work on an animated short and we came out with this story. We were then roommates in a big Paris apartment. We recreated Jerome’s room, the front of our building and Jerome’s head which was the only exaggerated duplication. We had some experience from previous works, and for this project we spent more than 10 months to finish it.

IA: Which of your latest spots helped you ameliorate your technique and experiment new things?

CE: Delhaize helped us testing our pipeline (Automatic Setup – Real Time Dynamic – Bake) that’s for sure. Thanks to a job we have finished two years before, we felt familiar attacking this very ambitious project.

IA: What about the Delhaize spot, how did that happen?

CE: TBWA Brussels had interviews with many production companies like us. We have worked really hard on the competition and we won it. After that, we started collaborating with Eric Guillon, the designer with whom we still work since then. We felt really comfortable working with Eric, we are on the same page. The project went on smoothly and we even delivered two days in advance. It took us two months to create, produce and direct this spot using all our knowledge and experience.

IA: What was the viewers reaction?

CE: They just loved it. Delhaize received a huge number of emails congratulating it for the graphic universe. It was a clear success.

IA: What do you think your studio added to the work?

CE: We added all our knowledge in design, animation and rendering.

IA: Can you tell us more about the technical aspect of this spot? Which software did you use and how did you split the responsibilities?

CE: We worked with Maya and Fusion. We started with the storyboard of course, but we were also working on the design at the
same time, and the modeling team was also on the go. There was a team responsible for characters and another one for the decoration. We gave the priority to the characters and once these were done, we used our home setup plug and the automatic rig that allow us finish one character in one day. The animation lasted 3 weeks and rendering took another month.

IA: Was there a lot of changes in the final work relatively to the initial ides?

CE: Yes a lot, we had to create everything from scratch. The agency’s brief was very short: “A star is looking at the preparations of a party on earth. The star wanted to feel the warmth of the party and it came closer. That is how snow arrived to Eart. The design, cutting and the graphic takes were all created by ChexEddy.

IA: Did you have lots of difficulties with the project?

CE: Absolutely not, everything went very smooth.

AI: Any future projects coming out soon?

CE: We are still in the talking, there is nothing sure for now. We will continue our SFX and animation work and we’ll keep answering job leades.

Links
Chez Eddy : www.chezeddy.com