Bear Grylls - Escape from Hell - Discovey Networks

The Studio @ Smoke & Mirrors have once again had the pleasure of working with the highly talented Discovery director Meriem Adib on the latest campaign to promote Bear Grylls new season ' Escape From Hell ' .
The premise for the show is based around the world renowned adventurer and survival expert and how he reveals the true life stories of ordinary people trapped in extraordinary situations of survival. The idea for the promo was to have Bear in a hellish landscape and literally willing his way out of hell by not giving up and sheer determination.
For The Studio one of the main challenges was that Bear was not available for the main effects shoot so he had to be shot on green screen on another day using motion control so the move could be used on the main effects shoot.
A pre-viz animatic was produced prior to any filming to experiment with camera speeds and lenses mainly due to studio constraints and also to try different ideas for the action within the shot.Once the move had been finalised this data was passed onto the motion control crew and was used on both shoots.
For the main effects shoot numerous plates had to be shot of fire and explosions as well as burning paper, these plates were shot at various speeds and offset moves were programmed into the rig to compensate the speed changes.
This was to allow Meriem the creative freedom within the edit to experiment with vary speeds whilst keeping the integrity of the move.
Post was all done within the Studio using Nuke for the production of the matte painting and Smoke for the compositing. All plates needed stabilising and individual elements were added to enhance the shot like extra flames and reflections.
The transition formed a big part of the sequence and a 4k plate needed to be produced to retain the detail of the eye as we travel through, as well as complex warp techniques to mimic the reflection of the image as it passes through the retina.
The final grade was done by the Smoke & Mirrors grading team and the audio and sound design by Arge.
Director - Meriem Adib
Client - Discovery Network UK
Offline - Final Cut
VFX supervision - The Studio @ Smoke & Mirrors
Post - The Studio @ Smoke & Mirrors
Grading - Smoke & Mirrors
Audio - Arge