In 2014, film escaped its 2D confines on the silver screen, becoming more malleable a medium so that audiences could interact within their worlds. Not only did technology become a recurring character in many of this year’s blockbusters, innovative techniques and tools allowed filmmakers, VFX directors, and animators to push their creativity in new directions: we saw the rise of virtual reality and multimedia experiments in cinema, which hint at the ever evolving future of film, and at the same time observed a return back to celluloid's analog roots. Massive world-building, never-before-possible visuals from CGI and 3D, and immersive, enhanced cinematic experiences were 2014’s greatest hits in the film world.
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This is the Year in Film:+ The first feature film was released for Oculus Rift, an immersive horror flick.+ In a documentary inspired by Spike Jonze’s Her, creatives including LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy and actress Olivia Wilde described their personal experiences with love and the impact of technology.+ Robot film Construct made CGI look even more realistic using a new technique of combining ray tracing software with motion capture techniques.A still from 'Eye Know'+ Tokyo night lights turned into a kaleidoscopic symphony of light in Hiroshi Kondo’s short film, Eye Know.+ The fate of star-crossed lovers was in our hands for interactive film, Possibilia, which was this year’s Future of Storytelling Prize winner.
+ We spoke with Factory Fifteen about creating the disintegrating apocalyptic universe for their short film for The Bug's "Function / Void."+ A Google Glass-donning FKA twigs danced and digitally multiplied in a film for Google Glass.
From Tobias Stretch's music video for Christopher Bono's "Unity" via+ A new animation star was born in Tobias Stretch, who walked us through the process of creating entropy for his stop-motion music video masterpiece for Christopher Bono's song, "Unity."+ Jean Luc Godard made this year’s most surprising 3D film, and we took a look behind-the-scenes with his longtime cinematographer, Fabrice D’Aragno.+ We stared at a movie that stared back at us, and peered into Imogen Heap’s life through a documentary made from her social media.
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Image via The Movie Bit+ For its first reboot in a decade, the newest incarnation of Godzilla would have taken 450 years to design on a single computer.+ In May, we premiered the video centerpiece for the Sónar Festival, “a mixture between Jaws, God Save the Queen and The Exorcist” as director Sergio Caballero describes.
+ Interactive film Leviathan revealed the massive potential for video games intertwined with augmented reality to create new forms of cinema.+ We digested short films that deconstructed interplanetary relationships and transformed greenhouses into a surreal jungle.+ Journalist Nonny de la Peña, a pioneer of “immersive journalism,” showed how reporting could be revolutionized with virtual reality.
Thjorsá River #1, Iceland, 2012, Edward Burtynsky.+ Canadian filmmakers Jennifer Baichwal and Nick de Pencier documented photographer Edward Burtynsky’s journey to capture massive panoramas of the world’s bodies of water -- both natural and manufactured.+ The directors of Obvious Child and Fishing Without Nets shared what they learned from working on their first feature films.
A sketch of a car in 'Snowpiercer.'+ Snowpiercer’s production designer took us aboard the train, and Ernest and Celestine’s animators invited us into the drawing room.+ In June, MoMA acquired Bjork’s Biophilia project, a visual experience of music and the first app to be added to their permanent collection. During the summer, Bjork’s documentary premiered.
A GIF from Ishtar, via+ We descended into the underworld with Kinect-based film, Ishtar.+ Master Cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki created the illusion of a single massive tracking shot for Birdman, and we rewinded back to his previous work on Gravity to Y Tu Mamá También.
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Still from New Nosthetics+ In short film New Nosthetics, virtual objects emerged and floated within a pastel landscape.+ Filmmaker Cy Kuckenbaker turned four minutes of traffic footage into an infographic of color patterns.
«Relief», Julien Maire+ In October, we watched a film without film, a zoetropic animation made of 85 3D-printed figurines.+ Artist Yorgo Alexopoulos transformed still images into cinematic 2.5d works.+ We learned the secret to sound in movie trailers, and met the crowd-sourced cast of the Banksy documentary.
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