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Take for example the opening scene of Alavandhan, when Kamal fights with the terrorists in the snow clad peaks of Kashmir or the final scenes when Kamal jumps down from a multi-storeyed building and also when both the Kamals cling to the flying balloon. They are filmed so naturally that the audience, who invariably come to the edge of the seat with a dropped jaw, do not realise that they were in actuality made in a small chamber, with the aid of Visual Effects. ‘Must be due to the ingenuity of the foreign team that Kamal must have employed for the shots,’ is the normal reaction when the secret is let out. But, hold your breath! They were made with the help of a Chennai based team. Yes. By Indians and that too by Chennaiites. The brain behind the nail-biting scenes was Til Studios Ltd. - a company that is barely 1½ years old.
Though he has worked for Maya, Dhevadhai, Dhesiya Geetam etc., Madhu says that the experience he gained when working for Alai Paayudhe and Alexander are memorable and valuable. It was in Alexander that graphics was employed in the title song. And in Alai Paayudhe, graphics was employed to bring out the ‘accident scene’ involving Shalini, very realistically. Mani Ratnam, says Madhu, was impressed by the visual effects that he had created for ‘Oruvan’ showing Sarath lunging forward before a running train and retrieving a child from the railway track. That made him call Madhu to work for Alai Paayudhe. A quick chat with Madhusudhanan, Visual Effects producer and General Manager of Til Studios Ltd… Tell us something about your experience in working for Alavandhan…
So, you worked for Alavandhan right from the beginning… Yes. We were invited for the story discussion too. We prepared a storyboard for each scene. We drew the boards as and when the scenes were explained to us. Kamal was quite impressed with what we did and gave us the assignment. Dhanasekaran worked as the storyboard writer for Alavandhan. It has to be mentioned here that Dhanasekaran worked for Hey Ram and also for Marudhanayagam. It was he who created the tattoos that Kamal is shown with in Alavandhan. He drew those tattoos on Kamal. We employed motion control camera for this movie. What were all the scenes in which you employed visual effects?
And then there is the crowd that comes to see the dance performance of Manisha. The sequence was shot with just 15 persons for audience. And then we rolled up the number with visual effects to show the impressive crowd shown on the screen. The scene showing Manisha on fire, the scene when junior Kamal is sitting in a car outside the auditorium and senior Kamal appearing before him in the same frame, the last scenes when both Kamals hang from the balloon were all made with visual effects. From where did you bring/import all the equipment needed for creating such excellent effects?
Have you received any other assignment after Alavandhan? Yes. Lot many. GV Films, Kadhir, Mani Ratnam, Hrithik Roshan have all called us for fresh assignments. We have signed for two English movies - 24 Hrs and Conviction - by Paramount Pictures. What is your opinion about the understanding that Kollywood has about using visual effects?
If only they call us for story discussion, we can advise them properly and help them bring down production cost very considerably. People are under the impression that ‘visual effects’ is a costly business. It is wrong totally. With proper planning, visual effects can bring down cost of production to a very great extent. There are two kinds of visual effects - visible and invisible. People mostly go for the visible effects and the awareness about invisible effects leaves a lot to be desired. Are you doing anything to bring about that kind of awareness?
We are conducting a programme shortly in Star Plus, explaining all the intricacies of the field, its present condition and what the future holds. There would be interviews and conversations of experts in the field. In short, we aim at creating competition. A healthy competition. Only healthy competition can enrich the field and challenge it to much greater heights. --Saravanan
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Alavandhan has created a kind of mixed feelings among the public. Some are rather reserved about its success commercially and the crowd that it may pull to the theatres. However, it is too premature to pronounce anything by way of judgement at this stage. But the fact remains that the heights of technical excellence that the movie has reached is something unprecedented in the history of Indian cinema. Kamal has once again established the fact that all his movies would without doubt carry his stamp of technical excellence and his eye for details.
‘Actually, they had signed up with an Australian company, Cutting Edge, for visual effects of Alavandhan. They also announced the name of Cutting Edge during the puja of Alavandhan. And then they called us and spoke to us and we assured them that we can match their technical excellence. I then came over from our branch in Los Angeles and worked for Alavandhan as its Visual Effects producer,’ says Madhusudhanan, General Manager of Til Studios Ltd. Madhu has already worked for 49 movies providing visual effects. Alavandhan is his 50th.
Well, when we accepted this assignment, there were some two three difficult challenges before us. The double-role that Kamal did in Alavandhan is not like the usual double-roles that have been done earlier in other movies. One Kamal appears with a medium build while the other Kamal has a he-man frame with a macho-male appeal. It is not that easy to bring such differing kinds of physique, played by a single actor, in the same frame. If at all we are able to capture this finer detail and are widely appreciated for it, it’s all due to the support and assistance of Thanu and Suresh
Krishna. Our sincere thanks to them. They lent us all support and encouraged us in all ways. Cinematographer Thiru went overboard to extend all help required by us and participated in our discussions readily, with an open mind. We requisitioned the services of George Mekarte who worked for Anaconda and also for Total Recall, which bagged an Oscar award for visual effects.
Many are under the impression that only the 2D scenes in the movie were created with visual effects. But they do not last for more than a minute in the entire movie. Actually, the scenes that were created with visual effects run for 31 minutes in the film. The opening scene showing Kamal fighting terrorists on snow topped peaks of Kashmir for instance. We did not go to Kashmir to shoot the sequence. We went to AVM Studios instead! There is a shot showing Kamal holding a piece of mirror in his hand and the image of a terrorist would be reflected on it. Actually, we created the reflection on the piece of mirror that Kamal is holding.
Equipment! Just the ordinary and usual PC that is used everywhere! At least others have Silicon Graphics computers. We didn’t have even that! Just plain, simple and raw human brains, a lot of creativity and imagination, and a lot more of hard work, combined with the regular PCs. That’s all and nothing more - and nothing less. Kamal was impressed with what we could do with such simple equipment and applauded us for our efforts.
Most of them are under the impression that ‘visual effects’ is just another ingredient in the masala. They come to us after they roll all the film into the box and completing all sequences. They ask us to do visual effects for just a song here or a dance there. They do not understand that this kind of an approach poses lot of difficulties to us.
We are 10 years behind Hollywood in the department of visual effects. This leeway is to be filled up. People here should realise that we in India are not in any way behind or less than the technical excellence of Hollywood. Titanic has created quite a sizzle about visual effects all around. Even a villager says, ‘the visual effects are so good,’ after seeing Titanic. We should now use this technology properly.
