Cannes: How South Korea Became A VFX Powerhouse

Before filming began on Bong Joon Ho's Oscar-winning film, the production team struggled to find one of the film's key locations: the stately home of the wealthy Park family. The chances of getting the right house are few, but the chances of getting a perfectly designed two-story house are even less. As a result, the film's art team created a set, a bungalow, which would become Park's house and the film's main setting.

Later, artists from Dexter Studios, a Seoul-based visual effects studio, added a second floor of the house with computer graphics based on his designs, including a staircase and a digital garden. The neighborhood streets were also rendered in 3D and digitally integrated into the film. During four months of pre-production, more than 200 Dexter artists worked on the project and nearly 500 VFX shots were used on the film.

We call it 'invisible visual effects' in the industry," said Kang Jong-ik, CEO of Dexter Studios. "It's often more difficult to create digital images that blend into the existing landscape."

Kang began his career in advertising in the late 1990s, when computer graphics were first introduced in South Korea. Then he founded his own studio and focused on movies. One of his earliest works, 1998's Guardians of the Soul , a psychological thriller about a religious cult, was the first Korean feature film to make extensive use of computer graphics. "It was an eye opener," Kang said. People call it "Hollywood style".

In 2011, Kang joined Dexter, which was founded by director Kim Yong Hwa, who m.

Dexter is currently producing several local films, including 2021 's Escape from Mogadishu and 2018 's With the Gods. The studio specializes in sourcing original IP from popular novels and online comics and providing visual effects for major Korean and international titles, including director Tomasz Baginski's fantasy adventure Knights of the Zodiac , which will be released in the United States later this month.

In 2010, only 10% of visual effects in Korea were for external content. In 2017, that number jumped to 56%, according to the Korea Institute of Culture and Tourism, due to increased demand for VFX jobs from China. The institute's 2019 Visual Effects Industry Tax Incentive System Study estimated the domestic visual effects market at $45.2 million, largely driven by five or six players.

Elsewhere, the country's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism expects the domestic artificial reality market to grow fivefold by 2020. VFX companies are now building virtual production studios, while conglomerates like CJ ENM and SK Telecom are investing in the market. Leading technology companies such as Samsung and LG are working with film studios to increase their investment in the development of high resolution LED screens.

Visual effects are used more aggressively than ever in Korean movies and dramas, regardless of genre. In Big Bet , a drama series about a casino tycoon in the Philippines currently airing on Disney+ in Korea, another VFX studio in Seoul, Gulliver Studio, made headlines for using anti-aging technology that includes AI to view the changes. From time to time in the appearance and sound of the characters and recreating the images without using special techniques during filming.

"This technique has been used in commercials before, but we are the first to try it in a drama series," said John Jai Hoon, CEO of Gulliver Studios. "We developed custom 3D masks and AI voice tools using compositing technology to create portraits of veteran actors in their youth."

South Korea is also the leader in virtual production. Seoul-based XON Studio recently partnered with SK Telecom, the country's leading mobile operator, to create a virtual studio using large LED walls capable of recreating different settings.

“The need for virtual production has increased exponentially during the pandemic,” said XON CEO Jang Won-ik, recalling a time when many VFX studios in Hollywood were closed. “Due to the quality and reputation of Korean production around the world, Hollywood studios are requesting to use Korean virtual studios with local production teams. The necessary scenes are planned to be shot in a virtual studio with a minimal crew in Korea and signed by a director in the United States.

The company is currently testing the possibility of connecting virtual studios in two different locations: Guiyang and Pangyu.

"There was a bit of a delay," he said, "but we thought it was technically possible [to shoot in two studios at the same time]."

If virtual studios are successful, companies could record around the clock in different locations around the world, taking into account time differences, which could reduce costs.

Global expansion is one of the main goals of VFX studios in Korea. But time differences and language barriers remain major hurdles for Hollywood studios to partner with local studios, especially when English-speaking countries like Canada and New Zealand, geographically close to Hollywood, offer tax breaks. for major film productions.

Gulliver Studio, which won a 2022 Emmy Award for Special Visual Effects for Netflix's megahit Squid Game , fielded requests for collaborations from studios around the world. Jeong thinks the quality of VFX artists in Korea has improved significantly over the past decade, but he thinks there are still some challenges ahead.

“We also lost a lot of talented artists to global studios after Squid Game launched,” he said.

Kang Dexter agrees that Korean VFX artists are skilled and offer a wide range of experiences, adding that the economy is another selling point for the industry.

"The quality of Korean sound effects artists has reached around 80% with major Hollywood studios," he said. "We are the best in Asia. In fact, many foreign companies in Japan, China and Thailand have requested business cooperation with our company. Korea's competitive advantage lies in its ability to produce high quality work. quality with relatively small budgets.

As K-movies and dramas flourish during the COVID pandemic, VFX businesses have also grown.

Following the success of the 2022 Westworld high school film, We're All Dead , another Seoul-based VFX studio will release the ambitious drama series The Dark Knight on Netflix in May. The company started in 2018 with 10 employees. In 2021, the company reaches 170 employees, largely thanks to the partnership with Netflix.

"We've gone above and beyond," says Westworld CEO Son Son-hye. "Because we have a lot of experience, we are good at solving problems."

Many industry players say tax incentives are a good way to boost the country's VFX industry and help local businesses stay globally competitive. Currently, depending on the volume of production, the state provides up to 10% profitability through tax incentives, which many industries believe should be increased. But an official with state-run film agency KOFIC said there were no immediate plans to offer tax breaks or additional subsidies to local visual effects companies.

There have also been complaints that the government favors global visual effects players over local companies. In 2019, the Seoul government approached Scanline, which provided visual effects for Hollywood blockbusters such as "Batman " and "Godzilla", with several incentives. After the announcement, local businesses complained of being discriminated against by local authorities for favoring foreign players.

"From an artist's perspective, the opening of Scanline is an opportunity to work on global projects," said Chai from the Korea Institute of Tourism and Culture. "I think the government is trying to raise the wage standards in the industry and develop the visual effects industry. But because the scale of the industry is still relatively small, there is competition between players. nationals and foreign actors.

Dexter is currently working on The Moon (working title), Blaad Studio's ambitious sci-fi drama about a man stuck in space, shot in the company's virtual production studio. Westworld is currently working on director Na Hong Jin's next film, Hope , which will be shot in virtual production.

Dexter's Kang thinks the Korean visual effects market has some limitations due to the scale of production, despite the industry's success. He said the budget should be increased to keep Korea's visual effects industry growing.

"Compared to Hollywood, Korea's film production budget is still small," he said. If the total production cost exceeds 20 billion won ($15 million), it is considered a success here. Compare that to Avatar 2 , which was around $400 million. Korean films still represent about 10% of Hollywood production.