As part of the HTC Mars beta test team, S4 Studios was asked to beta test the new Mars FIZTrack before its release to the public.  After testing was completed on our end, we created a detailed tutorial video explaining the setup process of the FIZTrack and how it is used in conjunction with Unreal Engine.  An interview with Geoffrey Kater, Owner/Creative Director was also filmed to give HTC clips and sound bites to utilize during their marketing campaign.  We are so thankful to Tim Wen at HTC for giving us this awesome opportunity.

You can watch the full video here!

You can purchase here

Creative Director Geoffrey Kater was interviewed by AJA to discuss his experience using the AJA Gen10 for genlock.  Thanks to HTC Mars Tim Wen for setting up this great interview!

Check out the Article here!

The Brown Brothers (Black Gryphon) having appeared on America’s Got Talent shot their latest music video at S4 ICVFX stage.  The music video was shot in front of several music industry professionals affiliated with the band and was a demonstration of what their live show could look like.   More akin to capturing a live musical performance the crew used a scissor jib, easy rig and slider to capture multiple angles in real-time.  Video backgrounds and music were synced, as well as vocal recordings were all coordinated by our video engineer Chad Williams.  Some scenes were blocked out as B-roll, but very few.  Directed by S4’s own Geoffrey Kater, DP Mike Monti from the Cinema Junkies and Produced by Paul Marshal.  Big thanks again to Gabe & Nate Brown for choosing our awesome studio and team.

Music Video to be released soon.
Check out Black Gryphon here!

KNR Productions shot the newest music video from Theory of a Deadman entitled “Two of us (Stuck)” at the S4 ICVFX stage in Canoga Park.  The team made great use of our 3 Wall LED volume and video playback systems for real-time dynamic in camera FX.  This kind of set up is perfect for interactive lighting & reflection as well as rich dynamic backdrops that sync with the music and sound was provided using our in-house speaker system for the band to play against.  Additional photography was completed on our standing apartment set just steps away from our ICVFX volume.  Thanks to Rich Ragsdale (Director) and Kevin Ragsdale (Producer) from KNR for bringing this super fun and awesome project to our stage.

S4 ICVFX crew – Geoffrey Kater (VP Supervisor), Macario Alvarez (LED Wall Tech), Chad Williams (Video Playback), Remmet Studios crew Paul Marshal (Producer) & Royce Dudley (Stage Supervisor) and all additional crew to make this happen!

See the music video!

Thanks to Eric Roberts shooting with the S4 Studios crew on our ICVFX stage.  We used Unreal Engine and two of our unique virtual library locations to complete the ICVFX portion of our shoot.  First shot of the day was a movie theater interior and we quickly changed to our NYC apartment location.  Between prep and shoot, our whole day was about 5 hours.  That is Virtual Production in a nutshell.

Thanks to Eric Roberts, Chris & Jordan supporting roles, Mike & Paul our Producers, Geoffrey our Director, Royce our DP, Cassius from The Cinema Junkies,  Ben & Chad on Audio – G&E, Macario & Julio on ICVFX operation and the support staff  at S4 ICVFX and Remmet Studios in Canoga Park, CA.

Los Angeles based Byron Qiao product specialist from Rokoko visited our stage today to demo the smart suit pro 2.  Mo-cap integration into our virtual production workflow is a must have for S4 ICVFX when using Meta-Characters in Unreal Engine, Unity and others.   We invited quite a few industry veterans  to attend the day for networking, education and biz dev.  Powerful, portable, affordable, rechargeable and easy to use.  Thanks again to Byron and Rokoko…we’ve got some great new partners in the Virtual Production space!

If you’d like to see a live demo with Byron, contact him at byron.qiao@rokoko.com

-Geoffrey Kater, Owner/Creative Director

CG Pro is a fantastic school teaching virtual production to current and future industry pros. For this event, they reached out to S4 Studios to supply our new S4 ICVX Virtual Production stage and technicians to lecture and demonstrate the procedures needed to operate a Virtual Production stage on a daily basis.

The first half of the day was instructed by Scott Rosekrans head of Real-Time at Zoic Studios.  Instruction was dedicated to LED Wall Tech procedures and how to operate Unreal projects, nDisplay and more while taking direction from the Director and DP. Students had  a chance to jump on the “Operator” workstation and manipulate the virtual world which is the whole point of using this kind of tool.

The second half of our day was lead by instructor Erik “Wolfie” Wolford featuring cinematography for lighting on a Virtual Production stage.  Starting with how to program and set up lights for the foreground real world elements to preventing light spill onto the wall and color matching.  How to marry the real world stage to the virtual world for a perfect shot.

CG Pro is an authorized Unreal training center employing veteran instructors who are currently working in the Entertainment Industry focused on games, film and broadcast courses using real-time and traditional CG software.

We can’t give enough thanks to  Jackie Cooper and Edd Dawson-Taylor, founders of this great Virtual Production School and are very pleased to be part of the CG Pro family to grow, collaborate and succeed with this great group of industry professionals!

-Geoffrey Kater, Owner/Creative Director

Sisu Robot arm has landed at our ICVFX stage in Canoga Park, CA.  The Cinema Junkies have graciously delivered this beauty to S4 Studios so we can test our Virtual Insert Stage with the arm and Unreal Engine.  Our 4 stage facility is perfect for motion control product and high speed shoots in addition to our ICVFX solutions.

Book it today!  Reach out for demos and availability.

-Geoffrey Kater, Owner/Creative Director