James Cameron's AVATAR Set Photo Scans!!!

Jim here. DAMN!! We are finally getting to see some AVATAR production stuff and I don't know how, but the fire burning for AVATAR just got stoked even hotter. At least we are getting to see something official and ultra cool... MANY thanks to one of my valuable UK readers for sending in these scans!!

Take a look at these scans from Empire Magazine for their recent edition - and be sure to pick up a copy too. These guys did a heckuva job getting these photos and getting a nice Cameron interview to boot. I am only posting some of the image scans I have as you really should pick up the magazine.

Here is some of what Cameron has to say and some filler in the Empire interview: "We've eliminated the animation from animation." With AVATAR's groundbreaking set-up, Cameron could observe the actors (left monitor) in a rough version of the final CG environment (right monitor).

Aside from an intricate, and very alien, ecosystem with predators large and small, Cameron's idea revolved around a race of indigenous sentient aliens called the Na'vi. Nine feet tall, blue skinned and feline in appearance, they would need to be entirely computer-animated yet interact seamlessly with the live action.

Cameron says: "With the capture technologies we developed, the actor can be any character they can imagine and the director can create any world, any time and any space."

And here is a great quote from Cameron on Spielberg and Jackson: "I invited them over while shooting AVATAR. I put the camera in their hands and they basically became two kids - on the inside every filmmaker is really just a complete geek. The amazing thing for me was just watching that seminal moment. They were running around the stage, working the camera, and that's the moment when they both kind of looked at each other in the eye and said, 'Let's make TINTIN.'"

Here we go! In order:
Pic 1: Cameron working the Fusion 3D Camera System
Pic 2: Cameron adjusting some controls on "The Volume" - he can see the actor in the green screen environment (with dozens of cameras surrounding him) and he can see what that very same actor looks like in a rough rendering of the CG environment in real time.
Pic 3: My source for the scans also took the time to photoshop the image from the right screen to correct for the angle!
Pic 4: Background shots of an actor dressed in military uniform and the super futuristic computer screens of AVATAR! These are highlighted in red boxes and then blown up below...
Pic 5: Military actor - seems VERY similar to my other exclusive image of what AVATAR's military personnel will look like.
Pic 6: The computer screens from AVATAR look like they curve around the user - awesome! Not unlike this cool screen (at the bottom of the post).
































































































Empire magazine also states that other than Spielberg and Jackson (who we already know are using Cameron's technology for shooting TINTIN right now), there are two others that have "signed up" and got "swept away" by the possibilities - Abrams and del Toro! SOOOO... one would naturally assume that Abrams' next STAR TREK could be 3D and *AHEM*, the two HOBBIT movies in 3D. Of course we at MarketSaw already knew that there was a strong chance of THE HOBBIT(s) being 3D didn't we? I couldn't hold back a smile guys...

So definitely something to talk about for awhile before the trailer comes out. Michael has gotten confirmation that the AVATAR trailer will NOT be attached to WOLVERINE unfortunately. Sorry to burst so many bubbles on that one - IMDb was all the rage about it today. The big thing here though was Cameron's emphasis that the 3D was not the huge tech hurtle that the new perfcap system was - and of course, crossing the "uncanny valley". Don't forget to buy your own copy of Empire Magazine for more coverage!

Stoked is not a strong enough word for how I feel about AVATAR... :-)