UPDATED: Avatar - Footage from the Comic Con Panel and news on Avatar day

James Cameron had some big news about his new sci-fi film, Avatar, at the San Diego Comic Con.

15 minutes of the film will be screened in digital theaters for free across the globe on August 21. After viewing the Avatar footage, I thnk an event such as this will serve the film well—at least, much more so than a typical trailer and marketing campaign.

We’re going to do something unprecedented. It’s a social marketing experiment. We’re going to take over as many IMAX 3D theaters and other select 3D theaters worldwide on August 21 and we’re going to let an international global audience come see 15 minutes of Avatar for free. It’s going to be Avatar day.

UPDATE: Here is the official press release from Fox about Avatar Day.

On August 21, the world will get its first look at director James Cameron’s motion picture epic AVATAR, when Twentieth Century Fox and Cameron debut the film’s trailer everywhere – while select cinemas and IMAX® theaters will screen extended footage prepared by the renowned filmmaker for this global “Avatar Day” event.

The worldwide trailer launch will be presented in all formats, including IMAX® 3-D, IMAX® 2-D, digital 3-D, digital 2-D, and 35mm 2-D. The trailer will also be available online.

The extended look at AVATAR will unspool only on August 21 – and only in 3-D – in select theaters and IMAX®. Details on locations and reserving tickets for this extraordinary and unprecedented experience will be announced soon.

In addition on the 21st, Ubisoft® will unveil the trailer for their videogame James Cameron’s Avatar: The Game, and Mattel will reveal the action figures for the film’s Avatar and alien Na’vi characters.

AVATAR takes us to a spectacular new world beyond our imagination, where a reluctant hero embarks on a journey of redemption, discovery and unexpected love, as he leads a heroic battle to save a civilization. The film was first conceived by Cameron 14 years ago, when the means to realize his vision did not yet exist. Now, after four years of actual production work, AVATAR delivers a fully immersive cinematic experience of a new kind, where the revolutionary technology invented to make the film, disappears into the emotion of the characters and the sweep of the story.

AVATAR opens in theaters everywhere December 18, 2009.

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Lobo, the main man, heading to a cinema screen Avatar style as PG-13?

Joel Silver has his eye on DC Comics' Lobo, the intergalactic biker with a fowl mouth and Gene Simmons-styled eye makeup.

However, the movie version of Lobo might be slightly more family-friendly than his original comics incarnation, according to Silver.

"I think it's structured now as a PG-13 movie," Silver told a group of reporters, according to SCI FI Wire. "I think we've done it that way, but I love it."

Some of the reckless Czarnian bounty hunter's behavior, such as his impromptu ripping off of Starfire's top in the DC series "52," for instance, would certainly need to be toned down for a PG-13 rating, but Silver thinks the technology already exists to bring the character to life visually. And he's looking to James Cameron's work for the answer.

"When any of you see 'Avatar,' see pieces of it, the technology is genius, the stuff that's out there that is doable is fantastic," he noted.

The story for the proposed film is already in its early stages, and bringing it into production sounds like something Silver wants make happen in the near future.

"Lobo is one I'm very excited about maybe doing one day, hopefully soon," Silver said. "I think we can do it. We've got a script we like."

Now I love a bit of Lobo mayhem, but a PG-13! Sure it will get the people in but you miss the ultra violence that the character is all about. Still it would be great to see him in hyper realistic 3D.

Do you feel Lobo could work as a PG-13 film?

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Avatar - Our first proper look at the alien Na'Vi

The 3D CG film that will supposedly change the face of cinema is getting closer everyday.

Now this Comic-Con banner gives us our first proper glimpse at the blue skinned alien Na'Vi in James Cameron's Avatar. They are all totally CGIified over a motion captured performer.

What are your thoughts on the image?

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Avatar - Footage of James Cameron's sci-fi 3D film has been seen and it is stunning

The first footage from James Cameron's Avatar has been screened to the public for the first time in Amsterdam at the Cinema Expo International.

It looks as if everyone who saw it was stunned.
Market Saw said: Until now, all we saw was the base in 3D, mostly humans and now the 2 N'avi Avatars.
They look NOTHING like the drawing you've seen. They're living creatures with blue skin, bigger yellow eyes than humans with tails. The avatars even look like their human connectors. You will NOT believe the detail. Jake's character will get a wound in a scene we saw later, it looked so real. You could see beneath the skin's first layer, like only real wounds show. We later meet creatures that look like the evolutionary link between a pherodactyl and a bird. They can connect with the N'avi and hunt with them. They connect with only ONE N'avi and do this by swallowing the N'avi's tail with their mouth so they stay connected.

The world outside is amazing. It all lives, breathes and works.
You will not believe the amount of leaves that look like someone created that jungle for real. Later scenes involved Grace, Norm and Jake in the jungle exploring. Jake encounters a animal which stomps towards him, Grace tells him to stand his ground. He does and the animal backs away to reveal a more sinister animal behind them. Jake fights it and runs.

ComingSoon: “jaw-dropping experience.” … “3-D until now has been used as a gimmick.” On the human characters inhabiting their Avatars: “It took my breath away. I thought–just like you guys–that I’ve seen it all with Gollum, or The Hulk, but Cameron has done it again. These creatures seem so real, that within minutes you forget you’re watching an enormous and very blue CGI character. Even the eyes are totally convincing. The characters have real personalities and a soul.” … “How the hell is it possible that I never once felt like I’ve been watching a movie where almost everything comes out of a computer?” … “The effects are in a league of their own. After some disappointing or even pointless 3-D movies, Avatar maybe the first movie where 3-D is properly utilized.”

Sounds as if James Cameron has got his King of the World hat on with this one. I'm still not sure if the story will be as good as the look of the film.

If you happen to be going to this years Comic Con you may be able to see some footage of the film.

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Terminator 2 in 3D and Avatar in post-production since March 2008

At 2009's 'Produced By' Conference, in Los Angeles, James Cameron's packed session revealed some pretty juicy stuff about Avatar and Terminator.

Reports from Nikkie Finke's Deadline Hollywood Daily include the startling revelation that "Jim Cameron acknowledged he's still in post-production on Avatar and has been since March 2008 even before live action photography ended."

Here's the good stuff from her report from notes taken within the closed door seminar.

"I feel like I've been living in a cave for a year," he told the "Produced By" Conference. No kidding!

He also enthusiastically endorsed the Avatar videogame which debuted at E3. "I'm not personally a gamer, but my younger brother Dave is a big gamer," Cameron noted, and together they made sure they liked it. He noted that "in some cases the videogame branded with film hasn't been as good as a film." He didn't name names, but he said the Avatar game will be "the same quality level" as the movie.

Cameron also told the audience he is up-converting Terminator 2 to 3-D if it’s cost effective.

Cameron talked again about how he wrote the script for Avatar back in the mid-1990s when he and Stan Winston co-founded Digital Domain. But when he took the screenplay to their special effects lab, Cameron was told it was just not possible to make the film with the current technology. So he sat on the project for more than a decade.

Cameron and his people on the panel expressed confidence that, by the time Avatar is released by 20th Century Fox on December 18th, there will be "several thousand 3-D screens" capable of showing the film.

Cameron also explained that so much has changed since he shot the Universal Studios Tour's Terminator 3-D ride: back then in 1995, each camera weighed 235 pounds and he had to shoot it wide open so he used so much light no one else could do night shoots at the same time. For Avatar, he created the Fusion Camera System technology for photo-realistic computer-generated characters through motion capture animation.

Cameron said that he wants 3-D to be less noticeable so it doesn't "take people out of the experience". He stressed that Avatar is not going to hit audiences on the head with 3-D even though almost every shot is green screen. But not 3-D constantly. He wants "one immersible experience" with 2-D and 3-D together and the audience so engrossed that they "won't notice the difference" .

'Christmas' could very well be soon known as 'Avatar' in the true Sci Fi households. Only six months to go! We're hoping to get some early footage (hoping). Keep your eyes peeled, right here.

Terminator 2 in 3D would be great but even better would be Aliens. Thanks to Pam for sending me the link.

Source: Sci-Fi

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The plot of James Cameron's Avatar

Avatar Producer Jon Landau spoke to /Film about the plot of James Cameron's 3D Sci-Fi epic. There are lots of spoilers to the plot here so beware.

Marine Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) has lost the use of his legs, so he accepts the chance to become part of a mining operation on the planet Pandora, where a new mineral is the solution for Earth's energy production. The planet Pandora is so harsh, the usual armor and environmental suit options aren't enough, so humans have come up with a clone program, combining DNA from humans and Na'Vi, the native species on Pandora, to create half-human, half-Na'Vi Avatars that are a genetic match for the individual human.

Jake Sully's brother was one of the original Avatars, but he's dead now. So the corporation asks Jake to come to Pandora and "pilot" his brother's very expensive Avatar, because his DNA is a match. That means Jake will be able to walk again.

The story flashes forward a few years, and Jake has arrived on Pandora, a planet of indescribable beauty, including the weird flora and fauna and the bioluminescence. Floating mountains soar above 900-foot-tall trees. Working for the mining corporation, Jake has a nasty encounter with a Viperwolf, one of Pandora's vicious creatures, and he nearly dies. But an arrow kills the creature — and it's been fired by one of the Na'Vi, played by Zoe Saldana, who starts telling Jake the truth about life on Pandora.

Jake starts to realize the Na'Vi live in harmony with nature, dangerous as it is, on Pandora. And he decides to help the Na'Vi fight for their freedom from humans — even though it means his Avatar will be driven away, and he'll lose the ability to combine with it. He'll give up his ability to walk, in order to save these noble savages. Landau described the film as not dissimilar to Pocohontas. The power suits make up a small part of the film. Cameron is definitely contemplating a sequel.

People who have seen the 3D footage say it is stunning, especially when you see Pandora at night and everything glows with that bioluminescence that must have been inspired by Cameron's undersea adventures.

Everyone is saying that this is going to change the face of cinema forever. It is sounding a bit like the old Harry Harrison Death World novels mixed in with classic Western stories. It doesn't actually grab me as much as I though it would. I'm really looking to see it all and I want to get lost in Pandora when I put on the 3D glasses.

What if it looks amazing but isn't actually a very good film?

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Cameron and Zombie join Heavy Metal

Film School Rejects recently caught up with TMNT co-creator Kevin Eastman and asked him if he had any updates on the new Heavy Metal film. "I've got breaking news that Fincher and James Cameron are going to be co-executive producers on the film. Fincher will direct one. Cameron will direct one. Zack Snyder is going to direct one and Gore Verbinski is going to. Mark Osborne and Jack Black from Tenacious D are going to do a comedy segment for the film."

/Film have since found out that Rob Zombie (Halloween) is also going to direct a segment.

All in all this sci-fi animated anthology is shaping up to having some major names involved.

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Avatar Powersuit at E3

This looks really cool. I do like a bit of Mech and it's yet another reason to look forward to James Cameron's Avatar.

/Film had the photos via Collider.

These 14-feet tall Powersuits, called Heavy loaders, (potential spoilers) “are worn by human troopers on the surface of alien planet Pandora. One sequence is going to show a group of Powersuited troopers, led by Matt Gerald’s Corporal Lyle Waynefleet, laying waste to a Na’vi village, torching it with flamethrowers and even causing civilian casualties.”

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Our first look at James Cameron's Avatar

IGN have the first proper look at the world of James Cameron's Avatar. Not through images from the film. Instead they are from the video game that has been developed in conjunction with the film. In the video below Cameron talks about the film and the game at the recent E3 press conference.

Cameron said that the movie takes place in the 22nd century, on a large Earth-like moon called Pandora, with rain forests, 1000-feet tall trees, and many different types of creatures. The new story in the game will parallel the story in the movie, meaning you can play the game without worry of spoiling any of the movie.

Video Game - E3 2009 - E3 '09 Live

What do you think of the screenshots?


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Avatar - Concept art from James Cameron's Sci-Fi wonder

The good folks over at Marketsaw were given permission by Fox to publish these lovely pieces of concept art from James Cameron's highly anticipated film, Avatar.

The images are from a book called The Art of Avatar which has a forward by Peter Jackson.

/Film describe the above picture as "This one appears to show action from a set piece rather near the end of proceedings. Fleeing in the foreground is another one of the futuristic flying machines (most likely the Dragon Gunship, I think) and behind it is one of the native beasts of Pandora. This one, I think, is a Bansheeray."

The picture below shows more of the mech suit that had been previously posted. That could be Sam Worthington's character in the suit.
This artwork is lovely and to think that we will be seeing it all in 3D is mind blowing. It does look like Cameron may really be changing the face of cinema as we know it.

What do you think of the concept art? Excited?



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Avatar Mech? Could be.

This could possibly be our first look at one of the Mech Units from James Cameron's Avatar. MarketSaw posted and they are usually on the button with these kind of things so, fingers crossed, this is the genuine article.

Even if it isn't it is still a nice piece of design. Looks like something from Aliens, which was also directed by James Cameron.

Now that Terminator Salvation has been out for a bit in the States and you've had a chance to see Sam Worthington in action do you think he will be able to carry the Avatar film? Cameron has said that Sam's character is going to be in every scene of the film.

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Avatar: The Last Airbender - First photos of the cast

The less said about M. Night Shyamalan's The Happening the better. Instead lets turn our attention to the other Avatar film, not the one that James Cameron is doing in super-duper 3D, this one is Avatar: The Last Airbender.

USA Today had the first character photos from the production and you know what, they are looking pretty good. Noah Ringer, 12, makes his feature-film debut as the hero Aang. Slumdog Millionaire's Dev Patel plays the villain, a firebender named Zuko. The film is a live-action version of the show that opens 2nd July 2010.

Ringer didn't need to alter much to play Aang, who uses martial arts to manipulate the weather. Like Aang, Ringer keeps his head shaved and is an expert in martial arts. "It keeps me cool when I'm doing tae kwon do," says Ringer, a Texas native with a black belt who landed the role after sending a homemade DVD of him practicing the sport. "It's so cool to get the part."

Patel, too, seems suited for the film, the first of a planned trilogy. He earned his black belt in tae kwon do before he turned to acting and discovered the television show while filming Millionaire. "I started watching it in my trailer in India," says Patel, who plays the villain Zuko, a "firebender" (he manipulates flames). "I see why the fan base is so big. It's got action but a lot of moral messages."
Are you a fan of the cartoon? Do you feel the live action film will be a faitful adaption?

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Terminator Salvation - Early review sounds promising

Some early screenings of Terminator Salvation have taken place and it sounds like the trailers and footage we have seen so far have been bang on the money. This looks like it could be great.

Variety had this to say about it - Possible spoilers ahead:

McG exhibits an unexpected flair for the dreadful, abrupt and awesome. What we get here -- which was perhaps missing on the relatively sunny mental landscapes of "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" and "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines" -- is a sense of real horror: When humans are snatched up like Cheez-Doodles by skyscraper-sized Go-bots, there's no slo-mo relief or stalling. Stuff happens as it might were the world actually overtaken by demonic appliances.

Christian Bale, playing the "prophesized leader of the Resistance" John Connor, may have traded in the Batman body armor for "Road Warrior"-style outerwear, but one thing hasn't changed: He is, once again, a movie star playing second fiddle. Heath Ledger stole "The Dark Knight" away from him and Sam Worthington (who will appear in Cameron's "Avatar" this Christmas) heists "Terminator Salvation" from Bale, for the most ironical of reasons: In a movie that poses man against machine, Worthington's cyborg is the far more human character.

As a steel-beaded logo of Warner Bros. fades away, Marcus (Worthington), on death row for an unexplained crime, gets an 11th-hour visit from Dr. Serena Kogan (Helena Bonham Carter), who wears the headscarf and pallor of a terminal cancer patient. She wants Marcus' body -- literally. She wants to turn him into a cyborg.

Wracked with guilt, resigned to his execution, Marcus agrees to sign the release in exchange for a kiss. "So that's what death tastes like," he says, as she leaves him to his lethal injection.

This is not your governator's "Terminator."

Bale, meanwhile, playing the adult version of the hero-to-be portrayed by Edward Furlong ("Terminator 2) and Nick Stahl ("Terminator 3"), is as purposeful and furious as anyone played by Arnold Schwarzenegger or Robert Patrick. One suspects he's been studying Linda Hamilton in "Terminator 2," although -- let's face it -- this is serious business. It's 2018. Skynet -- the "aware" machine -- has all but accomplished its self-appointed mission of destroying the threat of people.

But pockets of rebellion continue to operate even if, as in the case of a charred and rubble-strewn Los Angeles, the local contingent consists of just two kids: Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin) and the mute/cute Star (Jadagrace).

Kyle -- given a slightly geeky and perfectly plausible portrayal by Yelchin ("Star Trek") -- will grow up to father John Connor after being sent into the future to meet Sarah Connor (if you haven't followed the "Terminator" time line, this is no time to be catching up).

Thus, he has to be preserved. So does John, given that it's been predicted since 1984 that he'll be the one to save the world. There's a lot at stake.

McG's direction is always intelligent. (He does seem to have a thing for "The Great Escape," which is referenced several times.) The script by John Brancato and Michael Ferris occasionally goes off the rails. Certainly, their insertion of an existential dilemma for Marcus -- "I need to find out who did this to me," he says, his chrome-plated plumbing having been exposed to the open air -- feels very late-inning.

And the obligatory borrowing from the previous movies ("Come with me if you want to live," "I'll be back ...") tend to upset the mood created within McG's bleached-out world, which is very deliberate and doesn't need the comic relief.

There are great bits though: The thrashing, centipede-like, killer-snake thingie, which has the personality of a wolverine, is a neat invention. So are the biker Terminators, which molt like malignant pinecones off their towering mother ‘bot. A Schwarzenegger lookalike -- it isn't clear whether it's the ex-actor CGI'd or a complete fabrication -- is funny, but in this case apt.

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James Cameron talks about Avatar and Sam Worthington

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Ridley Scott is toying with an Alien prequel

IESB recently spoke to Fox Co-Chairman, Tom Rothman about a whole host of things.

Regarding a possible Alien prequel, "There's been some talk. Ridley Scott, Ridley is right now working on Robin Hood, but I think he's toying with the idea and that would be great for us. I mean, it's always been a matter of, really, if you can get the originator to do it that would be the greatest thing, so I've got my fingers crossed, all of them."

Interesting indeed. How cool would that be to have Scott back on the Alien universe. Would we finally get to find out some more about the Space Jockey and how his ship crashed.

He also talked about Robert Rodriguez' Predators (and the fact that he has been given total control of the franchise), Daredevil, Avatar at Comic Con, Fan Four and the new Wolverine film.

Check out the full interview over on IESB.

Do you want another Ridley Scott Alien film? What would you like to see in a prequel? Should there be a definitive origin to the Alien?

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Avatar - Fan made trailer

In a distant future, humanity discovers the planet 'Alpha Centauri B-4', and for those scientists and astronauts who've traversed the gulf between neighboring suns and arrived on its alien soil know it as 'Pandora'. A world filled with an incredible diversity of beautiful and deadly ammonia-breathing lifeforms. Its also a world that harbors treasures and resources almost beyond price. But just as the original Pandora's Box wrought devastation on those who would use it for their own gain, so too this world may destroy not just the Pandorans home, but ours as well.

Avatar is the story of a wounded ex-marine, thrust unwillingly into an effort to settle and exploit an exotic planet rich in bio-diversity, who eventually crosses over to lead the indigenous race in a battle for survival.

Thanks to Pam for sending me the link.

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Michelle Rodriguez spills some great big spoilers on Avatar and Fast & Furious

Rodriguez plays Trudy Chacon in James Cameron's Avatar which is a film I can't wait to see. Everything about it has been kept super top secret and then she has to go and say this over on Latina (it's in invisotext so you'll have to drag the mouse over it to read it).

Anytime you’ve got a wild, independent, free-spirited woman, she has to die at the end of the movie, unless it’s a movie that’s so sci-fi that it can’t be real, like Tomb Raider. Me? I die in every film that I’m in this year. They’re just gonna have to keep on killing me. I’ll keep coming back, until they realize what’s hot and make flicks for bitches like me.

Why did you have to go and say that Michelle?

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UPDATED: James Cameron's Avatar - Some footage has been seen

TIME Magazine's Josh Quittner saw brand new footage from James Cameron's highly-anticipated Avatar, which 20th Century Fox plans to release on 18th December. Here are some snippets from the article:

More than a thousand people have worked on it, at a cost in excess of $300 million, and it represents digital filmmaking's bleeding edge. Cameron wrote the treatment for it in 1995 as a way to push his digital-production company to its limits. The movie pioneers two unrelated technologies--e-motion capture, which uses images from tiny cameras rigged to actors' heads to replicate their expressions, and digital 3-D.

The film is set in the future, and most of the action takes place on a mythical planet, Pandora. The actors work in an empty studio; Pandora's lush jungle-aquatic environment is computer-generated in New Zealand by Jackson's special-effects company, Weta Digital, and added later.

I couldn't tell what was real and what was animated--even knowing that the 9-ft.-tall blue, dappled dude couldn't possibly be real. The scenes were so startling and absorbing that the following morning, I had the peculiar sensation of wanting to return there, as if Pandora were real.

Cameron wasn't surprised. One theory, he says, is that 3-D viewing "is so close to a real experience that it actually triggers memory creation in a way that 2-D viewing doesn't." His own theory is that stereoscopic viewing uses more neurons. That's possible. After watching all that 3-D, I was a bit wiped out. I was also totally entertained.

The sci-fi action-adventure stars Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Michelle Rodriguez, Giovanni Ribisi, Joel David Moore, CCH Pounder, Peter Mensah, Laz Alonso, Wes Studi, Stephen Lang and Matt Gerald.

UPDATE: Thanks to Pam and AMZ for passing along this info - This morning, the blogosphere was rightfully up in arms over the reported cost of James Cameron's 3-D live-action epic, Avatar, which Time said was north of $300 million. It turns out, the movie's not nearly as expensive: it's currently budgeted at more than $200 million, which puts it in relatively the same ballpark as Cameron's last major film, Titanic, which luckily made all of its money back thanks to being the highest-grossing film of all time. - Business Insider

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Michelle Rodriguez talks about James Cameron's Avatar

Michelle Rodriguez has been out and about talking about Fast and Furious, but more interestingly she talked to MoviesOnline.ca about working with James Cameron on Avatar. She plays a pilot in the film. This is a little of what she had to say.

That guy is so amazing. He thinks in 12 dimensions at all times. That’s what I love about him. You could sit there and you could talk for hours about the advancements in molecular science or you could sit there and you can talk about mythology and story building, character building. You could talk about cameras, the history of film, the history of Russia. You could talk about flying to another planet. You could talk about space research. You could talk about underwater adventures. You could talk about how he constructed special technology for underwater adventures. Or you could sit there and talk to him about how he developed his own fricking cameras with his brother. I mean, like, this guy is a genius.

So, you’re working with a golf ball or you’re working with an “X” on a green wall and you’re just hoping that you’ve really hit your mark interacting with this. You’re just kind of trying to remember as much of your make-believe time at the age of 5 as you possibly could to get you through it. But, with this technology that he’s got, you just go there and you see what you’re interacting with right there because it’s a mixture of live 3D footage, the props on the set, and the virtual world that he spent God knows how long creating. It’s fucking amazing. It’s hardcore. I can’t even imagine anything bigger.

The more I hear about this film the more intrigued I get. I really want to see some footage from it. Thanks to Pam for giving me the heads up on this interview.

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Laz Alonso talks about making Avatar - 197 cameras!

Laz Alonso plays Tsu'Tey. He spoke to Blackarazzi about his time working on James Cameron's Avatar. He talks about the liberating feeling of shooting scenes in front of 197 cameras simultaneously, and reveals that he was still filming as of the date of the interview. He also discusses his own background, and offers his advice to those who wish to pursue their dreams in Hollywood.

Thanks to Pam for passing me this.

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