The Brief
To produce an immersive experience for the Henley River and Rowing museum that would allow visitors to experience a race in the Henley Regatta from the Cox's point of view.

Solution and Results
Inition created a bespoke immersive 360 degree experience using a head-mounted display. Two races were shot at the Henley Royal Regatta and Women's Regatta. In order to capture the all the action, the races were shot using a custom designed 360 filming rig, mounted in the stern of the boat where the Cox would normally sit.

Museum visitors wearing the installed head-mounted display which, thanks to a precision intertial tracking, allowed them to look around through a full 360 degrees of the action. A stereo sound track was also created with audio recorded from the races.

Post-production took place at Inition's and involved a conversion of captured 'donut' high definition video into 360° panoramic format. Inition also developed the software to view the 360° video inside a head-mounted display and interface to the tracking system.

As part of LG’s multi million pound 3DTV advertising campaign, Inition worked with Framestore to shoot a 3D cinema advert which aims to show film-lovers how the 3D experience can be recreated in their living rooms. The campaign for media agency Mindshare was directed by The IT Crowd star Richard Ayoade. It features comedy duo Tim Key and his sidekick Lloyd Woolf who take viewers on a brief history of 3D through to the latest developments and what the future holds.

The Brief
Framestore required a versatile, mobile and high-quality stereoscopic 3D filming solution and the expertise to operate it on crane for their one-shot-wonder treatment.

Solution
Inition specified the SI-2K mini system which offers a great compromise between size and quality. Combined with our matched UltraPrime lenses this offered a cost-effective and highly maneuverable solution on this technically demanding shoot. 3 Inition crew were on hand to build and run the rig (3D rig tech and assistant and stereographer).

Results
The advert is a tongue-in-cheek take on current formulaic 3D showreels and starts with Woolf dressed up as Godzilla destroying a cardboard city below him. The sequence then pans through other popular 3D viewing genres such as football and nature, before ending in a stage set front room with Key and Woolf on the sofa and the strap line "Bringing the magic of 3D home with LG".

Inition's Andy Millns was the stereographer on-set. Post-production at Framestore included adding VFX to the live action sequence which was on-lined by respected VFX artist and post-production consultant David Cox.

"I was very happy with the material from the shoot, the optical line up between the cameras was very good and the colour matching was as close as I've seen." David Cox, VFX/Mistika consultant.

The cinema advert marks LG's first foray onto the silver screen and will be shown alongside screenings of 3D movies Tron: Legacy and the new Chronicles of Narnia film, starting on December 10th.

**UPDATE** LG were so happy with FrameStore's ad that they commissioned a second-part. Framestore came back to Inition who provided the same team and kit for the second shoot which went as flawlessy as the first.

You can watch the advert here (in 2D only) or pay us a visit to see in 3D!

The Brief
Inition were approached by GPJ to create an engaging Augmented Reality piece of animation that supports the launch of the new Oral-B tooth paste.

Solution and Results
To back up the launch campaign and the Augmented Reality piece, Inition developed and created an interactive touchscreen poster, allowing the user to navigate through the benefits of the new product and watch videos highlighting the 8 benefits that the new paste provides.

The AR was shown at an industry launch of the new Oral-B Pro-Expert toothpaste, showcasing the revolutionary technology involved in creating the new product.

The AR piece was used to reinforce the key messages about the product from the presentations and videos shown at the launch, as well as allowing the user to get a quick and easy understanding of the key ingredients of the paste and what areas it tackles.

 

The Brief
To work with Drum PHD and Fallon, to help create Cadbury’s first ever 3D ad. The high profile ad spot screened prior to James Cameron’s 3D epic ‘Avatar’ in over 200 3D cinema screens nationwide.

Wach the 2D version here:

Solution
Using Cadbury Dairy Milk’s recent ‘Zingalo’ ad, which celebrates the chocolate brand’s fair trade credentials, Inition converted the footage into a fabulous 3D Stereoscopic version.

Results
The process of converting the existing 2D film into 3D was turned around in record time. The Zingolo ad lent itself well to 3D conversion because it features a head emerging from a garage and in 3D it appears actually to float right in front of the cinema audience creating a very impressive cinema experience.

Cadbury Dairy Milk’s ‘Zingalo’ advert has won the 3D Cinema Advertising Award at this year’s British Television Advertising Awards. The advert, which celebrates the brand’s fair trade credentials, featured a buoyant head which appeared to actually float in front of the cinema audience creating a very dramatic viewing experience.

The Award recognises the best TV & cinema commercials made by British advertising agencies and production companies. Working with Drum PHD and Fallon, Inition converted the footage into a fabulous 3D Stereoscopic version which screened prior to James Cameron’s 3D epic Avatar in over 200 cinemas nationwide.

The Brief
World-renowned filmmakers Deeble & Stone partnered with Inition to co-produce a 3D wildlife pilot in Africa called Distant Thunder 3D.

Solution
The shoot took place in Kenya and was produced in association with equipment manufacturer P+S TECHNIK. During the production process the team identified and perfected the 3D rigs necessary to shoot wildlife in the field of Africa. Being an environment of widely varying scales, Inition used equally a large variety of interaxial lens distances to capture the extremities of the landscape, from extreme close ups of chameleons eating lunch to the final dramatic time-lapse sequence of the Kenyan night sky where two still cameras were positioned 30 metres apart.

Over the space of a month Inition used a variety of 3D rigs - both commercial models and custom built. These included mirror rigs, 3D time-lapse set ups, side-by-side configurations and gyro stabilized, using SI-2K Minicams and shooting uncompressed RAW, recording to solid state drives so full creativity could be achieved in the post production process.

Every evening, the team reviewed the daily rushes on a large 3D screen to develop what was working and what was not. Over a two week period and in challenging stormy condiitons, we obtained enough spectacular footage to edit together a stunning 10 minute pilot.

Results
The promo premiered at the Dimension 3 S3D expo in Paris in 2010 and was later shown to audiences at the Berlin Film Festival 2010 and the Cannes Film Festival where it received a highly postive response.

Victoria Stone, producer and director of the pilot, in an interview with creativeplanetnetwork.com said, "Digital 3D is so immersive and experiential that it is perfectly suited to natural history storytelling. We were delighted that it was possible to achieve so much in such a short time. It was an extraordinary and very successful collaboration."

The Brief
Co-founder and director of Intion Stuart Cupit, also keen photographer and kite-flyer, decided to set himself a challenge to build a rig capable of taking panoramic aeriel photos from his parafoil kite...

The rig needed moving parts, had to be light-weight but strong enough to hold servos and a digital camera and withstand the odd crash landing.

Solution
Stuart designed the rig using 3D Studio Max and included 5 independent moveable stages, a complete gear system, fittings for 4 servos, a microcontroller, batteries and, most importantly, a digital camera.

The final design was printed out in one go (yes, no assembly!) using our Invision-XT 3D printer. The various joints and gears were designed in place with the 0.1mm clearance between any two parts required to  allow them to move independently. The VisiJet SR200 build material used is strong enough to be for functional finished products.

The gears, axels and sleeves freely revolve and the fleixble nature of the material, when printed in thin sections, allowed the servos to be held in place by sprung hinged latches. The servos follow a pre-recorded set of moves using a Milinst Wizard board.

Results

• A Picavet suspension allowed the camera rig to self-level and prevents twisting. A geared mechanism reduced the speed of one of the servos by 20 to 1 to allow the rig to be rotated. The gears were printed in place and once support material is removed just work with no assembly!
• The Flight: The whole rig was attached to a Sutton Flowform 16 kite using a pair wire hangups on 200m of cord. The kite needed a 25mph wind to get the 1kg rig into the air. Flown from Hamstead Heath, the rig took 50 blurry photos the first time! The second flight got some great shots looking south across London, and some bemused looks from on-lookers!

Check out our 3D Printing Service and our Future of 3D blog at fo3d.posterous.com for our latest experiments in 3D.

About our 'Future of 3D' series
The 'Future of 3D' series is about exploring the boundaries of future 3D technology through non-commercial creative projects. Supporting this type of work is core to Inition's core values of developing new uses of 3D technology, supporting creativity and nurturing the passion of it's staff and collaborators. If you have an idea for a 'Future of 3D' project, we'd love to hear from you.

Future of 3D
Inition’s “Future of 3D” series encourages work on non-commercial projects which help to push the boundaries of current 3D creative and technology. This was the first time we had seen a project go from sketched concept, through haptic modelling to a physical 3D printed model. Organic designs are not usually immediately associated with computers but with Claytools strength in creating organic shapes and our 3D printer's ability to print them, we see a great future for this combination of technologies in product design.

The Brief
As part of Inition’s “Future of 3D” series, our 3D printing team agreed to work with BA design student Kristin Katzer from the London College of Communication to realise a packaging design for fruits.

Solution
Concept- The concept for Kristin's organic design was based on structures of nature, in particular her research into “tafoni structures” produced during the calcification of porous sandstone.

Freeform Design- Designing these organic structures using a typical 3D CAD package would have proved very difficult, however with Inition's guidance Kristin realised the design through the intuitive interface of the Sensable Phantom Omni in conjunction with the Claytools software. Claytools is a design package specially tailored towards haptic modelling, allowing the user to directly sculpt, manipulate and feel the surface of a model through a pen-line interface attached to a motorised force-feedback arm.

3D Print- After adding colour to the CAD model, the complex design was prepared for print Paul Armand, one of Inition's 3D printing specialists. Our full colour 3D ZPrinter 450 printed out the model over-night including two end caps with extruded lettering.

Results
The final design forms part of Kristin’s degree and was shown at the BA Design Show at the London College of Communication in June 2011.

Thanks to Kristin for creating a great piece; the first thing we've 3D printed that has been created on a haptic device. 

The kit we used:  ZPrinter 450, Phantom Omni with Claytools software

Check out our Future of 3D blog at fo3d.posterous.com for our latest experiments.

Inition provided rock band Keane with depth information of front man Tom Chaplin singing to add a new dimension to their new music video, Spiralling.

The Brief
We were approached by Andras Ketzer, the video's director, with a request to record a singing head, extract Z-depth and colour information and provide 3D data giving him the ability to manipulate the head in a 3D modelling program.

Solution and Results
Keane's lead singer Tom Chaplin was filmed using our 2K stereoscopic filming system, based on Silicon Imaging cameras (3DVidRig-SI), with a pattern projected on the singer to help with the depth-extraction algorithms. We then used Inition's 3D conversion facility, to generate a Z-depth image at 25 frames per second and After smoothing, the z-depth images were used as a displacement map to create 3D geometry.

We provided 3D data as a sequence of greyscale heightmap images (z-depth). This gave the director the ability to render his animated head from any angle at any point in time making a very unique memorable music video.

Check out the render of the depth map video that we delivered to the post-production house.

The Brief
After collaborating with Inition on several test shoots, world famous fashion photographer Rankin chose Inition to supply the stereoscopic crew, expertise and equipment for a new pop music promo from Kelis called ‘Scream’. 

It was essential that the 3D aspect did not add time to the one day/2D schedule.

Watch 'Scream' by Kelis below (anaglyph 3D glasses required):

Solution
Inition used an Element Technica Quasar rig and SI-2K 3D camera system. Element Technica's motorised alignment, excellent rigidity and precise alignment, meant less correction was required on set and in post production, ideal when time was of the essence as it was with the Kelis 'Scream' production schedule.

Brett Turnbull, DP on the shoot said: "We shot 'Scream' in 2D and 3D simultaneously using the same camera system. The whole set-up was very flexible and mobile, allowing us to experiment and see instant 3D playback on set. With an ambitious storyboard and limited shooting time, it was a real bonus that shooting in 3D actually had very little impact on the day's schedule.” 

On the day of shooting, Inition supplemented the regular crew with a stereographer, rig technician and camera assistant, and supervised the post production which was completed at OnSight, ensuring that Rankin’s trademark photographic style was not comprised and actually enhanced by the stereography.

Results

• You Tube Hit- ‘Scream’ 3D by Kelis was launched as an anaglyph 3D video exclusively on video sharing website YouTube, generating over half a million hits and counting. It features an exciting combination of negative and postive parallax shots, perfectly suited for the genre of a music video.
• Inition's crew and equipment ensured the production schedule was adhered too and the director was able to fully concentrate on the creative process.

The Brief
40 cinemas across the country screened England’s home RBS Six Nations games live in 3-D. Archibald Ingall Stretton commissioned 3D specialists Inition to produce the matches which became the largest ever UK sports event to be broadcast live in 3D.

Solution
Using the latest 3D camera technology, the matches were captured from seven camera positions providing a comprehensive view of the game which included replays, match statistics and on-screen graphics. Inition worked with outside broadcast experts SIS Live and used 3D 'Quasar' rigs from Element Technica for the shoot. Broadcast graphics specialists Wurmsers creating bespoke stereoscopic graphics for the game.

The BBC is the UK TV rights holder for the 6 Nations – played between England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, France and Italy – and assisted Inition in the broadcast. Inition has worked on a number of 3D productions from football and ice hockey to track and music events. Inition were also the 3D experts behind the 3D transmissions of England’s clash with Scotland at Murrayfield, in 2008, as part of a 3D test for the BBC.

Results
Forty Odeon and Cineworld cinemas screened the matches, beginning with England’s official centenary game, against Wales on February 6, as part of a deal with O2, the England sponsor. The match against Ireland on February 27 was also screened live in 3-D.

Read TVB Europe's inside story on the project here

Read about the GOLD award we received for this project as winners of the Internationalist Awards for Innovation in Media here

The Brief
The producers of North One Television approached 3D creative services company Inition, asking us to provide the technical expertise for an ambitious 'virtual presenter' challenge.

Solution
Inition helped presenter Suzi Perry to win the ‘virtual presenter’ challenge (Season 15, Episode 4) in which she and Jon were invited to find the best way to present the show without actually being in the studio. Whilst Jon commissioned an android version of himself and placed it in the studio to take his place, Suzi came to Inition to make use of our motion capture technology.

Based on real-time 3D animation software Autodest MotionBuilder, LILA is Inition’s markerless motion capture solution which can provide show stopping interactive installations for brands, exhibitions, tours and marketing agencies.

Using LILA, Inition were able to capture the motion of Suzi in London and transmit this data to Birmingham to drive an avatar which was composited in the Gadget Show studio, all in real time.

Without any calibration required, Suzi stepped into the holo-deck style cube at Inition’s London studios where her silhouette was tracked by 14 x2D cameras. No markers or any special clothing were required. The vision processor software calculated a 3D mesh of her body from these views and a digital skeleton was applied using the Organic Motion plugin.

The frame-by-frame motion co-ordinates from the data were transmitted to the MotionBuilder system at North One TV studios via a special driver which then applied Suzi’s features- including clothes, hair, skin tones etc. The avatar of Suzi was composited into the studios of The Gadget Show next to the real co-presenter Otis and the android version of Jason Bradbury.

Suzi’s avatar character included full face expressions and mouth shapes driven by her voice, fed through LILA’s voice recognition software. The composited footage was sent back to Inition’s Shoreditch studios via Skype which Suzi could monitor on a screen, seeing exactly what the public would see.

Results
This project posed several challenges, not least because of the processing power required to deliver the avatar in real time. This was the first time a motion capture system had been used to drive another avatar over the Internet. By chosing to approach Inition for help, Suzi beat Jason's android by 16 points to just 12.

Based on the success of this project, North One Television decided to invite Inition to help create fun and innovative crowd games to be played at Gadget Show Live, a consumer event based on the television show. Read more about this here.

The LILA motion capture is a complete attention grabbing solution which is available for events, promotions and exhibitions. As well as hire of the LILA system itself, Inition also provide a complete production service with the hardware, software, and creative design of the characters, environments and interactions.