Disney Previews New Footage From ‘Frozen’ At Siggraph

Disney officially showcased several new clips as well as test footage and artwork from its upcoming animated film Frozen, at the Siggraph CG conference this Wednesday.

Among the clips was one featuring Princess Anna meeting Prince Hans.

In addition to the new footage, we also got several new Frozen-related tidbits from the film’s head of animation Lino DiSalvo.

“For John [Lasseter] to be involved in this film — acting choices, and pushing us from editorial to animation — was huge, During preproduction we were showing him characters, designs, animation tests, how the characters move. … Animation is based on a caricature of what you know. That is John’s philosophy — truth in acting and believability.”

DiSalvo also mentioned that the studio featured a special discussion with the voice of Elsa The Snow Queen, Idina Menzel.

“We talked about singing, her breath, acting techniques — her insight on the Elsa character. We went on the journey with her. It was huge having the actors there and having the animators hear what they were thinking.

“When [Menzel] would come in to read lines, I’d show her what we were up to, get her feedback.”

Frozen co-effects supervisor Dale Mayeda says that the ice and snow effects in this movie are unlike anything we’ve ever seen. Be prepared for unbelievable ice, frost and knee-deep snow. The team also went to great lengths to push the animation.

The Disney animation team took a research trip to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, to see how it feels to trek through deep snow. They even brought a heavy full-length gown that some team members wore in the snow to see how it would react.

Their work resulted in development of new tools to create the snow, including a solver dubbed Matterhorn. Disney Research in Zurich even got involved in the development. Matterhorn allowed the animators to control parameters in order to create fresh snow, wet snow or sticky snow.

Disney’s Frozen hits US theaters November 27

Source: The Hollywood Reporter