Rocket Science is happy to announce it has completed its move to swank new offices at 35 Golden Avenue. Built upon the floor plan of a former uniform factory, the new facility is located in the heart of the Junction at the top of Roncesvalle village, near both the subway and high speed rail to the Toronto Airport.
The new custom-designed facility will allow Rocket Science to grow to more than 100 artists and support staff, offering our clients an even more extensive range of services and capabilities. The massive artist space affectionately dubbed “The Barn” is one giant pillar-and-partition free space that can house all of our artists in a single cool, collaborative environment with custom screening rooms, 10 gigabit ethernet to the desk, and high speed fiber links to the world. In winter we flood the floor and turn it into a hockey rink!
Also housing a gourmet bakery and cafe, custom coffee house, and even a dance studio, the building at 35 Golden Ave is a modern marvel of design and technological advancement.
Rocket Science VFX is very excited to be a key part of the VFX team bringing Alcon Entertainment’s “The Expanse” to life. The massive space opera television series, which will air on Syfy later this year, is based upon the works of science fiction author James S. A. Corey, particularly “Leviathan Wakes”.
True to it’s name, Rocket Science is responsible for the CG build, animation, realistic rendering, and compositing of the key spacecraft in the series, the Tachi/Rocinante, the Canterbury, Tycho Station, and the Nauvoo for hundreds of shots throughout the 10 part series.
Rocket Science is excited to announce it has been selected to provide key visual effects sequences for the final fifth season of the hit AMC series, “Hell on Wheels”. A dramatization of the events leading up to the successful completion of the first transcontinental railroad across the United States, “Hell on Wheels” focuses on former confederate soldier, Cullen Bohannon.
Rocket Science contributed matte paintings, winter and mountain environments, and action sequence effects for the 14 episode fifth season.
Rocket Science VFX is proud to announce it has been selected by Toronto’s Cineflix Media to help recreate New York’s notoriously crooked Five Points neighborhood for BBC America’s hit series, “Copper”. Set in 1865, Copper follows the struggles of Irish immigrant Kevin Corcoran seeking justice as police detective. Led by VFX Supervisor Tom Turnbull (“Titanic”, “Day of the Triffids”), RSVFX is contributing extensive matte painting, 3d environments, and action oriented effects to help recreate the rough life of new immigrants in 1865.
Rocket Science VFX is proud to announce the 2013 BAFTA award win of company president, Tom Turnbull and the studio for its work on “Titanic”, presented at the British Academy TV Craft Awards Ceremony in London. The win for the Julian Fellowes’s penned epic miniseries “Titanic” (ITV/Shaw/ABC) represents Rocket Science VFX’s second award, having also picked up the 2010 BAFTA for “Day of the Triffids” (BBC).
Congratulations on this wonderful achievement go to the director, Jon Jones, show runner Nigel StaffordClarke, Writer Julian Fellowes, executive producers Julia Sereny and Jennifer Kawaja of Sienna Films, executive producer Simon Vaughan of Lookout Point, producer Chris Thompson, and post supervisor Lynda McKenzie.
Tom Turnbull, in his role as overall VFX supervisor of the miniseries supported director Jon Jones in his creative vision and the executive team throughout the filming of this incredible production. Tom later oversaw the close to 500 VFX shots completed in Toronto and Hungary in Post Production.
“Fortunately, thanks to Sienna Films. We had one of Canada’s top VFX supervisors, Tom Turnbull, a BAFTA winner for Day of the Triffids. Tom was with us throughout the shoot, and oversaw the immensely complex and demanding process“, reflected show runner and esteemed UK executive producer, Nigel Stafford-Clarke.
The dedicated artists of the creative team at Rocket Science VFX delivered 289 shots in all, including a fully CGI sequence of the iconic scene of Titanic colliding with the fatal iceberg, elaborate set extensions and environments of the ship, water, decks, and lifeboats, digital doubles, cgi water and smoke. The physical set of Titanic was immense at 2 ½ stories tall, over 150 feet long and filled the Budapest film studio. The actual vessel, however, was so vast that the set only represented less than 5% of the ship, leaving Rocket Science VFX to recreate and fill out most of the ship’s imagery.
“Tom and I are incredibly grateful for the fantastic work of our talented team of artists and support staff to be honoured with this BAFTA win. This award reflects the company’s reputation for expertise in VFX supervision and management of the creative and operational challenges of international coproductions to produce compelling award winning imagery worthy of international recognition”, says Rocket Science VFX general manager Anthony Paterson.
The other visual effects companies and their artists honoured for their dedicated work on Titanic include Spin VFX (65 shots), Digital Apes VFX (64 shots) and Vertigo Digital VFX (55 shots).
Rocket Science VFX is currently contributing its artistry to the highly anticipated “The Mortal Instruments” (Sony/Constantin Films), Atom Egoyan’s “Devil’s Knot” and “Queen of the Night”, “The Right Kind of Wrong” (eOne/Serendipity), Bryan Fuller’s “Hannibal” (NBC), “Copper” (BBC), “Hell on Wheels” (AMC), “Murdoch Mysteries” (Shaftesbury/CBC), and “Hemlock Grove” (Netflix).
A full list of the BAFTA TV CRAFT winners can be found at: http://awards.bafta.org/award/2013/tvcraft
BAFTA award-winning Tom Turnbull, president and co-founder of Rocket Science VFX, recently completed visual effects supervision of Julian Fellowes (Downton Abbey) penned “TITANIC”. “Titanic” a 11 million pound sterling international coproduction (between Canada, England, and Hungary) was a huge undertaking befitting a miniseries bringing to screen an unprecedented historic tragedy, that 100 years on this April 15th continues to captivate the world. The four part miniseries has enjoyed great success in sales and has already been sold in 80 countries worldwide.
For 12 weeks last summer, Tom supervised the Titanic shoot as it was filmed in Hungary with meticulously crafted sets and a giant custom built water tank. Tom delivered a customized vfx project management solution to the series producers that included extensive previsualization, and photo real effects for Belfast, Southampton, the iceberg, set extensions and, of course, a fully CGI Titanic. Tom led the post production efforts in Toronto of the creative team at Rocket Science VFX (289 shots), SpinPro (65 shots) as well as Digital Apes VFX (64 shots) and Vertigo Digital Effects (55 shots) in Budapest. Tom has completed many high end mini-series visual effects projects for clients, including “The Nativity“(BBC),“Day of the Triffids“(BBC), and Haven(CBS). Rocket Science VFX completed deliverables of 289 shots of photo-real set extensions, water set extensions and a cgi created iceberg sequence in a compressed timeline of 15 weeks
Titanic broadcasts in Canada on Shaw Media over four nights (Wednesday March 21,28, April 4, April 11), in the United Kingdom on ITV (Sunday March 25, April 1,8,15) and the United States on ABC (Saturday April 14 and Sunday April 15)
For Further Information please contact: Catherine Andrews at (416) 364 5678 or candrews@rsvfx.com.
Rocket Science VFX is a BAFTA award-winning and Emmy nominated visual effects company founded in 2002 and based in Toronto, ON. The company provides high end visual effects, customized project collaboration and visual effects supervision for film and television. Notable clients include Warner Brothers Television, Disney, CBC, CTV, ABC, Discovery Channel, Sony Pictures, BBC, and ITV. Recently completed projects include Titanic, Sunshine Sketches in a Little Town, A Dolphin Tale, Saw 3D, and Resident Evil –Afterlife 3D.
VFX Supervisor Anthony Paterson and the creative team at RSVFX, in collaboration with acclaimed Production Designer Stephen Roloff, designed and produced the VFX for CBC’s $6 million tv movie adaption of Stephen Leacock’s beloved comedic collection “Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town”.
It was important to the shows creators that the VFX give the period film a modern but magical feel to the story of the return to the archetype of all the small towns in Canada and RSVFX delivered.
The movie opens with a fanciful but photo-real storybook-style town unfolding in 3D,complete with a hotel, lake, and a 3D steam ship that lands onscreen with a splash. The RSVFX team made extensive use of photogrammetry techniques to reproduce each main street building in exact detail. One professional reviewer called it “one of the most inspired computer-generated sequences you’ll ever see in a movie “.
Rocket Science VFX was responsible for more than 70 shots for the period film including the sinking of the Miraposa Belle, a music video, and an elaborate frozen time sequence, in addition to the town unfolding sequence. “Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town” is the successful completion of another project that demonstrates RSVFX proven track record of providing creative artistic solutions specifically tailored to production needs on time and on budget.
“Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town” premiered Sunday February 12, 2012 on CBC. For further information, contact Catherine Andrews at 416-364-5678 or candrews@rsvfx.com
The 32nd Annual Genie Awards were announced today by the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television. Rocket Science is pleased to announce that its team has been recognized with a nomination for Achievement in Visual Effects for the remarkable film Edwin Boyd. The film was nominated for a total of 5 Genie awards after picking up the award for Best Canadian First Feature Film at the Toronto International Film Festival. 2012 marks the introduction of the VFX category to the Genie Awards and the Rocket Science team is proud to be a part of it. Nominees include Tom Turnbull, Robert Crowther, Ian Britton and Tony Cybulski. Winners will be announced March 8, 2012.
The BBC One/Power Pictures production of The Day of the Triffids has won the 2010 British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) award in the Best Visual Effects Category. Rocket Science VFX congratulates company president Tom Turnbull on this award and recognizes the hard work of our entire production team, including VFX Producer Tavia Charlton, 2d Lead Ian Britton, 3D Technical Lead Ariel Joson, and the rest of our kick ass Matte Painting, Compositing, and 3D Team. This year’s award recipients were announced Sunday, May 23rd, 2010.
The Fox Television production of Fringe has been nominated for a 61st Primetime Emmy award for Outstanding Special Effects for a Series. Rocket Science VFX congratulates company president Tom Turnbull on this nomination and recognizes the hard work of our entire production team, including VFX Producer Anthony Paterson, 2d Lead Ian Britton, 3D Technical Lead Ariel Joson, and the rest of our kick ass Matte Painting, Compositing, and 3D Team.
