Design-Design - Design and Designing For The Client

James Cameron’s new film Avatar has been released at the cinema on 18 December and visually it is every bit as ground-breaking as the reviewers said it would be. Cameron is known for leading the way in defining Science Fiction films from Aliens to The Abyss to Terminator 2 and now Avatar. Many of the shots in the film contain elements created with some of the common designer’s household software items from Adobe.

‘Very Special’ Effects

The video below demonstrates how Adobes Design software has been used to create some of the elements in the film including the use of Photoshop to create some of the textures seen on the creatures, Premier Pro used to piece together demonstration material [though they skirt around the fact that Avid systems will have been used for the final production] and Lightroom to preview and categorise the image libraries created for the film.

Review

Cameron has undoubtedly created a masterpiece of special effects that will lead a new era of film makers into the next decade. The story is unashamedly [by Cameron's own admission] a lame framework with which he can hang the story together and there are many subtexts – not only of war, destruction driven superpowers ploughing their way through indigenous populations – also a spiritual, new age theme of ‘mother-earth’ fighting back at the forces trying to destroy her. However, possibly unintentionally, there is another theme at work here and something that has been an ugly side to the internet for many years now…..that people online may not be what they seem. I wonder if all those abusive comments on YouTube and other social media would actually be said to people face-to-face in the physical world? In Avatar the power difference here is physical in that the user is a courageous [yet initially misguided] soldier injured and unable to walk.

Conclusion