MAL and MPC partner up once again on Apple’s visual effects-laden film ‘Unleash’

When Apple wanted to showcase the ability of their new A11 Bionic chip that’s used to enhance the phone’s performance during gaming, their agency MAL teamed up with MPC for the epic, action-packed film ‘Unleash’, creating a feature-film level of work on a commercial timeline.

Independent Media’s Doug Liman, who’s known for notable films such as The Bourne Identity and Edge of Tomorrow, directed the spot, with DP by Academy Award-winning Janusz Kaminski, who has worked on Saving Private Ryan and Schindler’s List.

The spot is based on Vainglory, a free-to-play online game filled with dragons and epic heroes. When the hero character ‘dAv11d’ plays the game on his phone, the real world and game world start to blend, with the creatures in the game coming to life as he battles his way through the bustling streets of Beijing.

MPC handled all VFX for the spot, creating the dynamic and ever-changing environment, as well as the three larger-than-life CG creatures featured in the film: the Minion, the Treant and the Kraken. They pulled in teams from their studios around the globe to utilize their character work skills.

CREDITS

Client
Apple

Agency
MAL

Director
Doug Liman

Production Company
Independent Media

VFX
MPC

Executive Producer (LA)
Karen Anderson

Senior Producer (LA)
Christian Downes

Associate Producer (LA)
Madeline Austin-Kulat

Creative Directors (LA)
Michael Gregory, Rob Hodgson

2D Supervisor
Oliver Caiden

Comp
David Ince, Hector Cabrera, Jim Spratling, Josh Guillaume, Rodrigo Jimenez, Kathleen Kirkman, Sam Shiftlett

Head of 3D
Ryan McDougal

Animation
Andrew Price, Chris Meek, Samir Patel, Sashdy Arvelo, Ty Coyle, Meghan Sesnie, Lyndsey Horton, Alex Moon, George Antzouildes, Ankan sanyal, Shiny rajan

Assets
Koustav bhowmik, Kalaiarasu P, Mithun Jacob Alex, Vivek Tekale, Shaik Abdul adil, Rahul Verma, Manideep sanisetty, Nanda kumar P, Vipin Tripathi, Uday veerepalli

DMP
Radhakrishna Rethinasamy, Sachin Sureshrao Dhapudkar, Mohan Rao, Srinivas Achary, Joyett fernandes

CG Supervisors
Josh Hatton, Julian Fitzpatrick

Lighting/ LookDev
Joey Sila, Julian Fitzpatrick, Nate Skeen, Tim Kafka, Clem Renaudin, Rune Mansson, Zhenya V

Modeling
Christian Sanchez, Joel Durham, Lim Bunu (Lersak Bunupuradah), Rodrigo Carrasco, Annie Zhao, Dennys Herman

FX
Andy Sheng, Jin Huang, Stefano Georgette

Concept Work
Tianhua Xu, Jeff Julian

Matchmove
Sivapriyan Seetharaman, Prashanth paramasivam, Nithin TK, Ajith PA, Ankit dheeraj Toppo, Achiraju Konduru, Shaik Abdul Rahim, Sreenivas Aditya, Sojesh Kannoth

Prep
Arulanandhan Pandian, Kajal Pandya, Kiran Veeraswarapu, Prashant Palaparthi, Vignesh E, Suresh pitchuka, Trishul pani Mishra, Vaishali Awaghade, Veerapandian

Roto
Joslin Job Mathew, Rajesh Kumar P, Shagandeep kaur, Sriram P

VFX Producer (London)
Mireille Antoine

VFX Line Producer (London)
Sandra Eklund

Production Coordinator (London)
Georgia Cook

CG Production Assistant (London)
Solomon Tiigah

2D (London)
Guillaume Weiss, Rod Norman, Emma Taylor, Michelle Tolo, Neil Miller, Dan Lorenzini

3D (London)
Anthony Bloor, Carsten Keller, Dominic Alderson, Kristian Jensen, Thomas Carrick, Andy Steele, Benjamin Tron, Arnau Gilabert