“Lilium Urbanus” by School of Visual Arts

  • ©Anca Risca and Joji Tsuruga

Conference:


SIGGRAPH Video Review:


Track:


    08

Title:


    Lilium Urbanus

Director(s):


Company / Institution / Agency:


  • School of Visual Arts

Description:


    This film, the story of a growing city in the form of a lily, is a collaborative senior thesis project. Starting from an empty field, the first step to a city’s growth is a small village. Electricity flows through the town, larger and larger structures grow, and a transit system is formed. Finally, an airport blooms to spread its seeds to farther places. The city is a living organism that is constantly growing. When it has fully expanded, it disperses its extra resources to create new cities.

    With two directors, it was important to come up with a concept that we were both excited to work on. We wanted something different from the character-driven stories that usually come out of schools, so we took up the challenge of expressing a story without characters. We both love nature as well as city life, and combining the two was a fun process during the film’s creative development. On the more technical side, we spent a whole lot of time on research and development. Initial growth designs for certain objects were completely altered after many unsuccessful attempts.

    Our goal was to illustrate the story of a city as a growing flower. We simply wanted to create something that is exciting and beautiful. We invite the viewer to enter our world and discover a new kind of flower, as if it is being seen for the first time. Ultimately, we would like everyone to watch the piece with fresh eyes and simply experience its beauty.

Hardware:


    Intel, Macintosh, BoxxTech PCs

Software:


    Autodesk Maya 8.5, Adobe After Effects 7.0, Adobe Photoshop CS3

Additional Contributors:


    Directors: Anca Risca, Joji Tsuruga

    Art Direction, Concept Artist, Matte Painting, Lead Texturing, Lead Lighting, Compositing, Animation, Modeling: Anca Risca

    Technical Direction, Animation, Direction, Lead Animator, Lead Compositor, Texturing, Lighting, Modeling, Rigging: Joji Tsuruga

    Music & Sound FX: Dante Nou

    Special Thanks: Joseph Burrascano, Christopher Fung, John McIntosh, Andre Stringer, Dan Vislocky, Dante Nou, Shilo, Nathan Love, Friends & Family

Animation / Video Overview:


Type: