Weta Digital Underway on Avatar Sequels

“Weta Digital has announced that it has gotten underway on the four Avatar sequels that James Cameron will direct for Fox,” writes Mike Fleming Jr in an article for Deadline Hollywood.

“Run by Senior Visual Effects Supervisor Joe Letteri, the Wellington, New Zealand-based visual effects facility now embarks on the most ambitious — creatively and financially –project in movie history:  four sequels to Hollywood’s all-time top grossing film, pictures that will be made in sequence at an estimated collective cost exceeding $1 billion.”

“What Joe Letteri and Weta Digital bring to these stories is impossible to quantify,” said Cameron.

“Since we made Avatar, Weta continued to prove themselves as doing the best CG animation, the most human, the most alive, the most photo-realistic effects in the world. And of course, that now means I can push them to take it even further.”

Avatar producer Jon Landau said: “The depth of talent at Weta is impressive and the culture of excellence is one that matches how we do things at Lightstorm. We also know that these next films promise to be even more ambitious than the first film. And, we know from experience that when it comes to technical innovation Weta is peerless.”

“Weta’s Joe Letteri has been preparing to bring to life Cameron’s vision of Pandora for a long time, and he said they relished the challenge,” reports the article.

“Avatar is the ideal type of film for us. Jim’s vision for the world of Pandora was always so much bigger than what we created for the first film. Helping him expand the language of cinema through new narratives set in such an expansive universe is the type of opportunity that rarely comes along twice,” he said.

The first Avatar sequel is expected in 2020.

Article Source: Deadline, Mike Fleming Jr, July 31, 2017
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