Sony Pictures Imageworks Inc. is a visual effects and computer animation studio headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia and Montreal, Quebec, with an additional office on the Sony Pictures Studios lot in Culver City, California.[2] SPI is a unit of Sony Pictures Entertainment's Motion Picture Group.[3][4]
 Logo used since 2006 | |
| Company type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | CGI visual effects Motion pictures |
| Founded | May 26, 1992 |
| Headquarters | 725 Granville Street, 5th Floor, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada 3875 Rue Saint-Urbain, Suite 415, Montreal, Quebec H2W 1T9 Canada |
| Additional offices | 10202 West Washington Boulevard, Culver City, California, United States |
Number of locations | 2 |
Key people | Michelle Grady (president) |
| Products | |
Number of employees | 800 (2018)[1] |
| Parent | Sony Pictures Entertainment (1992–1997) Sony Pictures Digital (1997–2015) Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group (2015–present) |
| Website | imageworks.com |
The company has been recognized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences with Oscars for their work on Spider-Man 2 and the animated short film The ChubbChubbs!, and received many other nominations for their work.
SPI has provided visual effects for many films; most recent include The Meg, Men in Black: International, and Spider-Man: Far From Home. They also provided services for several of director Robert Zemeckis' films, including Contact, Cast Away, The Polar Express, and Beowulf.
Since the foundation of its sister company Sony Pictures Animation in 2002, SPI would go on to animate nearly all of SPA's films, including Open Season, Surf's Up, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and films in the Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Smurfs and Hotel Transylvania franchises, in addition to animating films for other studios such as Arthur Christmas for Aardman Animations (co-produced by SPA), Storks and Smallfoot for Warner Animation Group (now known as Warner Bros. Pictures Animation), The Angry Birds Movie for Rovio Animation and its sequel (co-produced by SPA), Over the Moon for Netflix and Pearl Studio, and The Sea Beast for Netflix Animation.
History
editSony Pictures Imageworks was formed in 1992 with five employees to use computers to help plan complicated scenes for live-action films.[5] Located in the former TriStar building, their first work was a previsualization for the 1993 film Striking Distance.[6]
To fill the gaps between VFX jobs, SPI decided to partake in a more profitable animation business.[7] Its first independent animated effort was the 5-minute short The ChubbChubbs! directed by Eric Armstrong. In 2002, it won the Oscar for Best Animated Short. Early Bloomer, released in 2003, was the division's second short film and originally made as a storyboarding exercise.[8] SPI completed its first feature animation project in 2006 with the release of Open Season, which was produced by sister company Sony Pictures Animation.
In 2007, SPI acquired Indian visual effects studio FrameFlow to take advantage of lower labor costs.[7][9] Renamed to Imageworks India, a modern facility was opened in Chennai a year later.[citation needed] To leverage New Mexico's tax rebates and talent base,[10] a satellite production facility was opened in 2007 in Albuquerque,[11] becoming the largest post-production operation in the state.[12] In 2010, SPI opened a production studio in Vancouver, British Columbia, in order to take advantage of the local talent pool and government film production incentives.[13] Two years later, the studio doubled its Vancouver facilities.[14] At the same time, the Albuquerque studio was closed down due to declining New Mexico's subsidies and difficulty with attracting artists to move there.[10]
In the beginning of 2014, as part of Sony's cost-cutting move, SPI transferred a portion of its technology team from its headquarters in Culver City to Vancouver.[7] By May 2014, entire headquarters and production had been moved to Vancouver, with only a small office remaining in Culver City.[15] At the same time, SPI closed down its Indian studio, laying off around 100 employees.[16] A year later, over 700 artists moved into a new 74,000-square feet headquarters in Vancouver.[17][18]
On October 6, 2023, Cartoon Brew reported that DreamWorks Animation was moving away from producing films in-house at their Glendale campus to rely more heavily on outside studios after 2024, as part of a layoff by chief operating officer Randy Lake in a series of meetings the previous month. According to the report, SPI was named as the animation service for a then-unannounced DreamWorks sequel scheduled for 2025. The film will use a "mixed production model", in which pre-production would be done in-house at DreamWorks along with approximately 50% of the asset build and one hour of production, while SPI will handle the other 50% of asset builds and 20 minutes of shot production.[19]
Technology
editDuring 2009-2010, SPI made transition from traditional biased, multi-pass rendering system to a largely singlepass, global illumination system incorporating modern ray-tracing and physically based shading techniques. They have achieved that with Arnold Renderer, an unbiased stochastic ray tracer. Arnold, started in 1997 by Marcos Fajardo, was co-developed between 2004 and 2009 with SPI, where Marcos was employed, and a commercial branch is being developed by Marcos' Madrid based company Solid Angle SL (now owned by Autodesk). Arnold was used on projects such as Monster House, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, 2012, Alice in Wonderland, The Smurfs, Arthur Christmas and is being used on all upcoming SPI's films.[20]
Filmography
editSony Pictures Imageworks has provided visual effects and digital animation for the following films:[21]
Television
edit- The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest ("The Edge of Yesterday")
- Stuart Little: The Animated Series (CGI animation and visual effects)
- Love, Death & Robots ("Lucky 13" and "In Vaulted Halls Entombed")
- The Falcon and the Winter Soldier ("One World, One People")
- Hawkeye (2 episodes)
- The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special (TV special)
Controversy
editIn an article published by Vulture in June 2023, several animators quit Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse due to unstable working conditions. According to the Animation Guild, while Imageworks is associated with Sony Pictures Animation, Imageworks remains non-union.[23]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ Derdeyn, Stuart (September 22, 2017). "Vancouver's Sony Pictures Imageworks is on the cutting edge of VFX industry". The Vancouver Sun. Postmedia Network. Archived from the original on August 25, 2018. Retrieved August 24, 2018.
- ^ Bruce Constantineau (May 28, 2014). "Sony Pictures Imageworks to move head office to Vancouver". The Vancouver Sun. Archived from the original on May 31, 2014. Retrieved May 28, 2014.
- ^ "Sony Pictures - Divisions". sonypictures.com. Archived from the original on March 30, 2019. Retrieved June 7, 2015.
- ^ "Sony Pictures Imageworks". imageworks.com. Archived from the original on January 25, 2016. Retrieved June 8, 2015.
- ^ Halbfinger, David M. (October 31, 2007). "Sony Said to Be Pondering Partial Sale of Movie Units". The New York Times. Archived from the original on September 12, 2014. Retrieved September 12, 2014.
- ^ Failes, Ian (August 30, 2012). "From Speed to Spidey: 20 years of VFX and animation". FX Guide. Archived from the original on September 12, 2014. Retrieved September 12, 2014.
- ^ a b c S. Cohen, David (January 21, 2014). "Sony Imageworks Shifting Staff From L.A. to Vancouver; Layoffs Feared". Variety. Archived from the original on October 31, 2019. Retrieved August 22, 2015.
- ^ Tito A. Belgrave (September 8, 2003). "Making Waves with Early Bloomer". CGSociety.org. Archived from the original on September 24, 2006. Retrieved November 5, 2010.
- ^ "Sony Pictures picks up 51% in FrameFlow" (Press release). FrameFlow via The Economic Times. February 20, 2007. Retrieved November 23, 2010.
- ^ a b Verrier, Richard (February 29, 2012). "Sony ImageWorks to Close New Mexico Viz Effects Unit". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on December 8, 2015. Retrieved August 22, 2015.
- ^ "Albuquerque Studios Sees Special Effects of SONY Imageworks Deal in New Mexico" (Press release). Albuquerque Studios via PRWeb. May 20, 2007. Archived from the original on May 4, 2010. Retrieved November 23, 2010.
- ^ Kamercik, Megan (February 29, 2012). "Sony Pictures Imageworks to leave New Mexico". New Mexico Business Weekly. Archived from the original on February 28, 2014. Retrieved March 1, 2012.
- ^ MacInnis, Tara (August 14, 2012). "How Sony's Vancouver studios give Canadian animators home field advantage". National Post. Retrieved August 22, 2015.
- ^ Etan, Vlessing (February 3, 2012). "Sony Pictures Imageworks Expands Canadian Outpost". The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on September 24, 2015. Retrieved August 22, 2015.
- ^ S. Cohen, David (May 29, 2014). "Sony Imageworks Moving HQ to Vancouver". Variety. Archived from the original on September 1, 2015. Retrieved August 22, 2015.
- ^ S. Cohen, David (January 29, 2014). "Sony Imageworks India to Shut Down (EXCLUSIVE)". Variety. Archived from the original on January 13, 2018. Retrieved January 30, 2014.
- ^ Marchand, Francois (July 10, 2015). "Sony Pictures Imageworks unveils new Vancouver headquarters". The Vancouver Sun. Archived from the original on July 18, 2015. Retrieved August 22, 2015.
- ^ Lu, Cecilia (July 29, 2015). "12 photos inside Sony Pictures Imageworks new downtown Vancouver HQ". Vancity Buzz. Archived from the original on August 29, 2015. Retrieved August 22, 2015.
- ^ Amidi, Amid (October 6, 2023). "Dreamworks Shifting Away From In-House Production In Los Angeles; Sony Imageworks Is A New Production Partner". Cartoon Brew. Retrieved October 8, 2023.
- ^ Haines, Eric (July 20, 2010). "Marcos and Arnold". Ray Tracing News. Archived from the original on November 4, 2010. Retrieved November 24, 2010.
- ^ "About". Sony Pictures Imageworks. Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. Archived from the original on September 3, 2018. Retrieved October 3, 2018.
- ^ Robinson, April. "My journey to "Blade Runner 2049"". Autodesk. Archived from the original on April 2, 2019. Retrieved February 18, 2019.
- ^ Lee, Chris (June 23, 2023). "Spider-Verse Artists Say Working on the Sequel Was 'Death by a Thousand Paper Cuts'". Vulture. Retrieved July 10, 2023.