Pete Draper has been working within the CG (computer graphics) industry for almost two decades with previous roles as lead and senior artist, head of media and director of visual effects within studios in the UK and abroad. But destiny brought him to the Indian film industry, where he worked in Ghajini (Hindi), as VFX pipeline supervision and digital crowd control for Magadheera and created a fully immersive CG sequence for Endhiran (Robot). He was also associated with Baahubali: The Beginning and The Baahubali 2: The conclusion .
“I fell into this,” says Pete over the telephone from Hyderabad, where he is currently based, when asked if his entry into the Indian film industry was a deliberate decision. “It wasn’t planned. I had a break in my calendar, Kamalakannan called me to do the opening title sequence for Ghajini , which was of medical animation. That got noticed and led me to work with the same guys. I did Ghajini in the beginning of 2008. During the next few months, Kamal, Adel Adili and I originally formed an association to go into studios and monitor them. In 2010 we founded Makuta VFX.”
Pete is a self-taught CG artist. “I never studied for it. I always had an interest in art and computers and CG is an amalgamation of the two. I am self-taught and most of my generation is too.”
Pete says as an artist he is constantly evolving and that choosing the film he considers his best work so far is difficult, “Your last work is the best one. As artists we are always self critical and look to constantly improve on ourselves.”
Creating CG is an enormous task, Pete asserts. “Creating fire and water are tricky. Facial animation is exceptionally difficult because if it is not done right, viewers can always recognise something is wrong.”
Elaborating on the creating CG scenes, Pete says: “In essence, you have to imagine there’s a digital version within traditional filmmaking process. There is the set extension, where models are created based on the art director’s feedback, then the modellers develop the sets over every single surface on the model.”
“For lighting, you shoot the scene with a camera within the software. At times we use effects where we basically blow up a scene, so to speak, to make it more explosive.”
Recreating animals, Pete says, is undoubtedly one of the toughest jobs. Referencing Zoo , which airs on AXN every Wednesday at 10 pm, and is a thriller based on James Patterson’s novel by the same name, in which the food chain is reversed where animals attack humans, Pete says: “Creating animals in CGI is exceptionally difficult as you have to minutely observe animal behaviour and locomotion. You have to first build a wig and animal fur has to be groomed manually. The process involved is time consuming and the attention to detail is overwhelming. An approximation of the skeleton is created, muscle stimulation is created on the animal and then you have animation.”
There have been countless films which has used CG, but the pioneering film in CG says Pete is: “ The Last Starfighter which was made in 1984. Everything was done in chroma in the film. I was 12 or 13 when I watched the film, and that is when I thought this is something I could do!”
Pete says setting up his studio in Hyderabad emerged from his work in Magadheera .
“I already had a small recognition within the industry, so I thought of setting up a studio here, unlike in London where setting up a studio and getting recognised is tough,” he concludes.
