Eli Roth brings the first volume of John Bellairs’ beloved Lewis Banavelt book series, The House with a Clock in its Walls, to the big screen. The film tells the story of how a young orphan, named Lewis Barnavelt (Owen Vaccaro), aids his magical uncle (Jack Black) to uncover a clock that has the power to bring about the end of the world.
Our team was delighted to collaborate once again with director Eli Roth and VFX Supervisor Louis Morin to produce 160 shots for this magic-filled movie. Our team of 150 artists from Montreal and Quebec City, led by VFX Supervisor Alexandre Lafortune, was tasked with bringing to life the griffin, the automatons, Baby Jonathan and the Clock Room.
A lot of time was put into the shading, the look dev and modeling of the automatons, which are seen from up-close. For the griffin, our artists were provided with an onset plastic topiary, which, although it was the right scale, took our artists 4 months to work on its vegetation, twigs and lion aspect. For the Clock Room scene, our artists embarked on extensive research of gears to create the 450 pieces of CG gears and pipes that make up the shot.
