PROJECT / EUROLEAGUE - FINAL FOUR
We were contacted by Filmmaster Events to collaborate on content and AR elements for the 2021 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague Final Four Cologne.
This was one of a kind AR experience, with 3 tracked cameras, with a variety of colourful and models filling up the Lanxess Arena in Cologne during the pre-game shows of the final phase of the top European basketball competition for clubs.
Our team worked on the AR elements, Notch and video content together with Adriano, Giorgia and Giulia from Filmmaster’s international creative team.
2021 - TURKISH AIRLINES EUROLEAGUE FINAL FOUR COLOGNE
AR Show, Notch, 3D animation, Video Content.
WORKFLOW.
We realised this show would be a dense AR experience and we had to work in a smart way to let Nicholas in the Disguise department work without applying a numerous changes to what we were creating in the Notch world.
The same also happened for Notch, we wanted to get the project up and running and flexible to changes without inputting keyframes or working on any kind of timeline for fast iteration.
We used Alembics and FBX for the objects; their own timing resulted in an internal frame count that we could use to trigger elements instead of running those via Disguise.
Each layer was composed of 6 video inputs , animation triggers and some indexes for team logos.
Each layer also had as a separate delivery; videos for virtual tribune leds, court leds, arena 360 leds and our own virtual mediacubes.
The cameras were tracked using MoviePeople’s encoded heads/tripods and calibrated using Disguise’s XR workflow.
10 PORTALS.
Inspired by this year’s Euroleague Basketball branding and colours we created an opening portal to our countdown.
This is our first dimension, an explosion of colour and light.
9 CRYSTALS.
Our first portal brings us under the field towards the underground, the core of our dimensions.
We displayed 2 huge crystals appearing on the court, these two crystals represent the finalist teams, displaying their MVPs.
8 - PARTICLES.
We created a fast particle look as a transition between two heavily 3D looks.
At first, everything was made in Notch, but we figured the floor didn’t necessarily have to be in 3 dimensions.
As long as the cameras were on tripods we had the opportunity to use some flat rendered surfaces on top of the floor.
The floor was created using the experimental particle feature in Embergen and rendered in a sequence directly there, letting us iterate very quickly on possible changes.
7 - SOUNDWAVES.
Together with the team from Filmmaster , we tried to create an earthquake - shockwave effect to reopen our portal to our court dimension.
This shockwave element was also used to display music and sound, revealing a DJ playing in the screens of the show.
6 - DJ SCRATCH.
The team wanted to show a DJ connected to the urban culture of basket scratching on decks.
We enlisted our dear friend DJ 2P to help with the hands and synced his movements to our virtual deck.
5 - BIG FONTS.
We used fonts, text and kinetic type to create colour in the court and led surfaces.
The number 5 gets thrown in the air by the motion of fonts revealing other words that are close to Euroleague Basketball branding.
4 - CITY OF COLOGNE.
An artistic interpretation of the city of Cologne represented the number 4 of the countdown.
We used a variety of geometric elements and architectural stylizations to create this colourful scene, we also edited footage provided by Euroleague Basketball for the billboards and added some flying drones.
3 - LAVA.
Whilst working on a variety of elements, we thought about introducing lava. As this is present in this year’s Final Four logo, it was an amazing occasion to showcase flames, particles and materials.
We used Houdini for the floor lava, Cinema 4D and Substance Designer for the floor rocks, Embergen for all the ledwall renders including the 14K virtual tribune (special thanks to JangaFX for the unrestricted version).
2 - PARTICLE PLAYERS.
For this look, we unleashed our Rokoko Mocap suit.
Two oversized players took over the court with a basketball action made of particles and trails.
1 - FANS & TROPHY
Number 1 in our countdown represents the EuroLeague Final Four trophy on a podium and Fans.
0 - BASKETBALL
Number 0 is the end of our “game”, representing a variety of urban elements connected to basketball.
When these elements fall back into the court two TVs and the EuroLeague Final Four trophy come back showing the two finalist teams.
SEMIFINALS.
Credits.
EUROLEAGUE BASKETBALL
New Events & Entertainment Senior Manager: Francesca Mei.
OMBRA
Creative / Lead Designer : Lorenzo De Pascalis.
Project Manager : Giulia De Paoli.
Notch Designer : Marco Martignone.
Producer: Massimo Labadini.
Designers: Gianluca Barbiero, Alessandro Doria, Luca Martinelli.
Video Editor: Nic Allstot.
VIDEO PROGRAMMING
Disguise XR Specialist & Programmer: Nicholas Di Fonzo.
Disguise Specialist : Kevin Buysse.
FILMMASTER
Project Manager: Clara De Paul.
Creative Director : Adriano Martella.
Creative Team : Giulia Accatino, Giorgia Albani.
Production: Tommi Massara.
Camera Director & ShowCaller: Vittorio Anelli.
M2L
Lighting Designer: Marco Piva.
Lighting director : Lorenzo Bassani.
Programming Studio and Disguise Rental : ByLEX.