DIFFICULT TASK: Some of the toughest tasks for animators working on Shrek the Third included getting clothes and hair to move properly and making the cat look right. Subscribe to Archivestuff Have your say An hour's drive south of San Francisco in California's Silicon Valley, an ordinary white building houses the secrets to one of Hollywood's most valuable franchises. The building sits in an industrial park filled with other white, equally unexceptional office buildings.
A few kilometres away are the global headquarters of Google, Yahoo! and Apple. The first sign the building is exceptional and linked to Hollywood is a glass box proudly sitting in the foyer containing a shiny gold Academy Award statuette.
It is the 2001 best animated film Oscar awarded to Shrek, the record-breaking movie about a large green ogre. The building is the headquarters for PDI/DreamWorks, the animation studio behind some of Hollywood's most successful animated films, including Antz and the Shrek films. In the three floors above the foyer several hundred animators, special effects wizards and artists are rushing to meet the fast-approaching deadline for the latest instalment of the ogre franchise, Shrek the Third.
"We won't be getting much sleep," Shrek the Third's director Chris Miller, looking weary and scratching his head, says as he greets the international media contingent touring the studio. The pressure is on Miller and his team because the first two Shrek films cashed in at the worldwide box office, with the original earning $US484 million ($NZ656.8 million).
2004's Shrek 2 topped the original, collecting a mammoth $US920.7 million and making it the seventh most successful film in history and the highest grossing animated film. With an Oscar for the first and a mountain of cash for the sequel, the bar was set high for Miller, who inherited the director's chair after Shrek 1 and 2's Kiwi director Andrew Adamson opted to helm the new Chronicles of Narnia film in New Zealand.
On this day, despite the tight deadline, Miller and DreamWorks opened up its studio to reveal many of the secrets behind the Shrek franchise. The Shrek team is a streamlined operation, with most beginning their careers at the studio aged in their early 20s. They stayed on to become veterans of the two previous Shrek adventures.
The original Shrek took seven years to make. With the experience, streamlining and advancements in technology, Shrek the Third took just 3.5 years.
They're a happy bunch, and why not? On the bottom floor of the building is a large cafeteria offering free hot and cold meals and drinks. Near their work stations are comfortable lounges to relax on.
The big perk is the staff share in their film's profits. "We do get some perks," Tim Cheung, the 34-year-old head of character animation, said. "We have a bonus plan that happens depending on how well the movie goes.
"Hopefully we'll get a little something for Shrek the Third." PDI/DreamWorks has used the same in-house computer software since its first feature length film, Antz, in 1998, but the company has continually upgraded it. "We also have faster computers which allow us to see the results faster, which allows us to do our work quicker and refine quicker," Cheung said.
"In Shrek the Third, you will see subtle improvements. "Shrek's facial animation is better. "He has nose wrinkles that weren't there in the first two movies.
" In Shrek the Third, all of the major stars who voiced the characters in the first two Shrek films are back. Mike Myers voices Shrek, Cameron Diaz returns as Princess Fiona, Eddie Murphy is Donkey and Antonio Banderas is Puss in Boots. The biggest new name is music star, Justin Timberlake, who voices a young King Arthur.
"When we found out Artie would be Justin Timberlake we tweaked his character's eyebrows a little bit, so it had a bit of a nuance of Justin," Lucia Modesto, character technical director supervisor, said. The PDI/DreamWorks tour revealed many of the secrets behind the making of Shrek the Third. DIFFICULT TASK: Some of the toughest tasks for animators working on Shrek the Third included getting clothes and hair to move properly and making the cat look right.
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