Connor must decide whether Marcus has been sent from the future, or rescued from the past. As Skynet prepares its final onslaught, Connor and Marcus both embark on an odyssey that takes them into the heart of Skynet’s operations, where they uncover the terrible secret behind the possible annihilation of mankind.

The highly anticipated new installment of The Terminator film franchise, “Terminator Salvation” is directed by McG (”Charlie’s Angels,” “We Are Marshall”). The screenplay is by Michael Ferris & John Brancato. Moritz Borman, Derek Anderson, Victor Kubicek and Jeffrey Silver are the producers, with Jeanne Allgood, Dan Lin, Mario F. Kassar, Andrew G. Vajna and Joel B. Michaels serving as executive producers.

Wishing to avoid comparisons with the Transformers franchise, McG has stated “Transformers is an excellent movie, but our film is not about big robots. I wanted it to have lots of hardware and velocity, but I didn’t want to hang the whole movie on it.”

Visual Effects for the movie were undertaken by Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), with Asylum fx and Rising Sun Pictures bringing their skills to various sequences.

And in addition to the brilliant CG work generated for ‘Terminator Salvation’, McG contracted Stan Winston studios to create real life models of some of the terminator characters that the human cast could interact with.

Stan Winston, the special effects pioneer who designed the original Terminator endoskeleton, worked on Terminator Salvation prior to his death in June this year. McG intends to dedicate the moive to Winston’s memory.

The film stars Christian Bale as John Connor (”The Dark Knight”), Sam Worthington as Marcus Wright (”The Great Raid”), Anton Yelchin as Kyle Reese (”Star Trek”), Bryce Dallas Howard as Kate Connor (”Spider-Man 3″), Moon Bloodgood as Blair Williams (”What Just Happened?”), Common as Barnes, (”Wanted”), Jane Alexander as Virginia (”The Unborn”), Jadagrace as Star and Helena Bonham Carter as Serena Kogen (”Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”)

“Terminator Salvation” will be released in the U.S. on May 21, 2009 by Warner Bros. Pictures. Sony Pictures Releasing International is distributing the film in most international territories between May 2009 and June 2009.

CREDITS:
Director: McG
Screenplay: Michael Ferris & John Brancato
Producers: Moritz Borman, Derek Anderson, Victor Kubicek and Jeffrey Silver
Executive producers:  Jeanne Allgood, Dan Lin, Mario F. Kassar, Andrew G. Vajna and Joel B. Michaels
Cinematographer:  Shane Hurlbut
Production designer:  Martin Laing
Editor:  Conrad Buff
Costume designer:  Michael Wilkinson
Visual effects supervisor:  Charlie Gibson
Animatronics supervisor:  John Rosengrant
Music: Danny Elfman

SOURCES & RELATED LINKS:
www.sonypictures.net/movies/terminatorsalvation
http://terminatorsalvation.warnerbros.com
Industrial Light & Magic: www.ilm.com
Rising Sun Pictures: www.rsp.com.au
Asylum fx: www.asylumfx.com

The spot, spearheaded by VFX Supervisor Piotr Karwas, opens with several office workers standing around a cubicle as a box of flowers is delivered to a fellow co-worker. When she opens the box she gets more than she bargained for as a wilted but rowdy bouquet of flowers hurls insults at her while co-workers look on in shock.

The message is clear: sending flowers in a cardboard box isn’t the best way to show you care. Teleflora flowers are hand arranged and hand delivered in a keepsake vase, not in a box. That’s the Teleflora difference.

Asylum is a premier visual effects and design company, handling high-profile features, commercials, music videos, and emerging media content for web and mobile platforms.

Asylum, under Mark Romanek’s direction, conceptualized and created the metaphoric world inside the LG vacuum. This spot was done in close collaboration with BBH/NY and Mark Romanek from Anonymous. Aside from the live action pullout shot of the lady vacuuming, the entire spot was created in CG.

From Asylum’s Sean Faden:

“Asylum faced a number of unique challenges in bringing LG’s Vase to life, including an all CG environment, tremendous amounts of fluid and dynamic simulations, and an abstract story needing to be told within the limited time of a 30 second spot. Due to the open-ended nature of an all CG piece, the progression from storyboards to previs to final renders took Asylum’s team through multiple concepts of how the paint should flow, how dynamic the cameras should be, and how architectural the environments should read.

The camera work was tricky because the shots needed to look as if they were actually shootable on a partial set, while at the same time giving as much screen presence to the fluids as possible. Thankfully, it was agreed upon at an early stage that the camera’s movement would gradually increase as the story progressed- which gave the animators a rough rule of thumb to follow. Also difficult was figuring out how to actually form the final vase while demonstrating a consistent compaction across the final moments.

Early tests had more of jigsaw puzzle build with swirling liquids mixed in, but in the end, the pieces were made to collide and compress while scaling down as they hit each other. Additionally, a fluid vase slowly swells up from the center giving the illusion that the vase is growing from the continual flow towards its center.

With VFX expertise by way of Asylum, McGuiness is able to showcase the merriment that goes into producing each and every mouthwatering Hershey’s Kiss. Opening with a churning vat of delectable milk chocolate, the Kiss is born.

After being shaped, it’s then hurled into its iconic silver wrapping. Down and around a giant slide it goes, landing smoothly in a barber’s chair where it checks itself out. Showered by cheers and well wishing paparazzi of other Kisses, a machine flings the superstar into one of three predetermined destinations. The job of the kiss is fulfilled; when it’s chosen by a young boy and handed off to his mother, whose elated face says it all.

ABOUT TOOL
Tool of North America is known for its mastery of “very, very short films, with blatant product placement.” The aptly-named production company serves as an implement, enabling directors to discover-and then endlessly rediscover-what they do best. Tool’s talented roster and knack for delivering laugh-out-loud comedy and arresting visual style engenders advertising’s top honors. Well-established in the integrated media arena, Tool serves as a resource for agencies, collaborating with creatives to develop compelling content.

Tool’s directors hail from diverse disciplines, including still photography, Academy Award-winning cinematography, documentary filmmaking, British TV comedy, and top agency creative posts. This diverse pool allows Tool to approach every project with a spirit of handcrafted excellence.

CREDITS
Client: SWA

Agency: GSD&M Idea City/TX
GDD/AD(s): Scott MacGregor
CD/Writer: Mitch Bennett
CD/AD: Wes Whitener
Writer: JC Abbruzzi
AD: Tim Delger
Producer: Paul Golubovich
Associate Producer: Erika McKay

Prod Company: Tool/bicoastal
Director: Harry Cocciolo
DP(s): Josh Hess, Pete Romano (underwater)
EP(s): Jennifer Siegel, Brian Latt

Editorial: Chrome/SM
Editor: Adam Parker
Producer: Cristina Matracia

Online Company: Brickyard/SM
Online Artist: Patrick Poulatian

Telecine: Riot!/SM
Colorist: Siggy

VFX Company: Asylum/SM
VFX Artist: James Allen
Producer: Shelby Wong

Audio Post: Lime/SM and Play/SM
Engineer or Mixer(s): Lorin Silber (Lime), John Bolen (Play)

Shoot Location: Ontario, CA & Nassau Bahamas

(article by CGnews)