Lord of FX

Wired profiles Stephen Regelous, the Wellingtonian behind The Two Towers‘ jaw-dropping battle scenes. Regelous created a program – Massive – which would supply “smart crowds” to supplement the on-screen action. Each agent has an individual brain, with thousands of different modes of being. “When an animator places agents into a simulation, they’re released to do what they will. It’s not crowd control but anarchy.” The results have been so successful that even Regelous “can’t tell what’s Massive and what’s not anymore.”