UNDERBELLY:SQUIZZY (TV Series)

Chronicling the rise and fall of one of Australia's most notorious criminals, 'Squizzy' sees the Underbelly franchise make a welcome return to Melbourne, taking advantage of the cities unique period style locations and experienced crews.

We are also retuning to provide a huge range of digital VFX and production solutions across the series.

With many challenging period productions already in the can (Cloudstreet, Miss Fisher, Dangerous Remedy, Dr.Blake, Howzat and Hansom Cab), the team at Chroma were a perfect fit for the challenges and expectations required for Underbelly, bringing our production-streamlining post solutions to all departments. The production leaned heavily on green screen, CG integration and digital augmentation to create its expansive locations and set pieces while reducing cost and complexity across a range of departments.

As always, we are also producing the opening titles, now on it's ninth iteration, although a different approach this time around.

Underbelly: Squizzy hits the Nine Network in 2013.

SUMMER FILM SCHOOL 2013 (LIVE)

Chroma returned to the Filmmaking Summer School at Melbourne University for a third year of our VFX Masterclass. The session covers the entire spectrum of digital effects and their emerging implementation in television drama and long-form production.

Find out more about this great initiative here and maybe we'll see you in 2014!

PAPER GIANTS: MAGAZINE WARS (Telemovie)

Continuing on from their nostalgia-fuelled success with Puberty Blues and Howzat, Southern Star have just completed work on the sequel to the acclaimed Paper Giants, titled Magazine Wars.

We have worked closely with the production to deliver a range of digital effects solutions for several scenes across the two parts, including location augmentation, CG integration and advanced compositing. We were also tasked with design and production of the new opening titles, with slightly different iterations for the two episodes.

Paper Giants 2: Magazine Wars comes to ABC later this year.

THE KINGDOM OF DOUG (Short)

Cloudberry films latest short The Kingdom of Doug, directed by Victoria Thaine, has just completed post production.

The Pozible funded short tells the story of a suicide cult and one member who decides not to come along for the ride. We pitched in with some digital composites and cleanups.

CHROMA WELCOMES JACK NOLAN (News)

We are pleased to welcome Jack Nolan to the VFX team at Chroma.

Jack will be working as a CG and compositing artist for our drama and broadcast clients. You can reach Jack at the office or email: jack@chromamedia.com

DEAD FRONTIER (Game)

We just finished helping out with the new PC zombie themed MMORPG game, Dead Frontier.

Pixelpickle games brought us in to provide finishing for the opening CG cinematic created by Robert Dowling. Work also included final grading and sound production.

Check out the game here

MYSTERY OF A HANSOM CAB (Telemovie)

Drawing on our expertise with period-style production solutions including Cloudstreet, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries and most recently, Dr. Blake, we have just completed post production on 'Mystery of a Hansom cab' for Burberry Productions.

Set in 1880's Melbourne and based on the book by Fergus Hume (1888), the story calls for several location augmentations, turning largely modern street scenes and locations into bustling Victorian Era set pieces along with the standard set of digital clean ups and removals throughout.

One shot in particular, a CG shot of the view across Princess Bridge, was covered in a recent article in the Age. And check out Karl Quinn's video breakdown of the shot here.

Mystery of a Hansom Cab heads to the ABC later this year.

Watch the official trailer here

DR BLAKE COMES TO ABC (TV Series)

December Media's new period-style drama, The Dr Blake Mysteries is coming to ABC and ITV in the UK. We are providing digital effects across the whole series, with the usual cleanups, paint outs and augments to interior and exterior locations, in addition to some more involved CG work for some sequences.

The Dr.Blake Mysteries hits screens in 2013.

HOWZAT! (Telemovie)

Southern Star's latest tele-movie chronicles Kerry Packer's struggle launching World Series Cricket as a more media-friendly enterprise in the 1970's.

We were brought on board to produce a range of effects solutions for the two part tele-movie.
In addition to the creation of several CG shots including stadium and backgrounds for gameplay sequences, there was also a huge amount of removals, augmentations and cleanups required across the two episodes. This was crucial in providing locations, production design and the crew itself with time-saving solutions to logistic, creative and safety factors on set, while still delivering the scope and realism the script demands.

The productions multi-format approach to shooting had us working with Alexa, DigiBeta and original archival footage, modifying, matching and integrating cast into old broadcast footage.

UPDATE: Click here to read The Age's recent article on our involvement in Howzat!, watch some exclusive video breakdowns of the effects via The Age's iPAD App and hear an in-depth discussion on how Howzat! leveraged VFX to solve production issues on FBiRadio 94.5FM

Check out the Howzat! promo here!

MICALLEF RETURNS! (TV Series)

We have had the pleasure of working with Shaun on SBS's 'Newstopia', producing the opening titles, graphics and VFX for all three seasons, including the crazy Inspector Herring final episode. It's huge popularity and weekly format were both gruelling and exciting, but like all good things, it had to come to an end - UNTIL NOW!

Mr. Micallef returns to current affairs with a acidic twist with 'MAD AS HELL' for ABC, bringing intelligent news satire back to Australian screens every week.

We have been tasked with designing and producing the opening titles and graphics package, and we went a little nuts! Inspired by Fritz Lang, MC Echer and film noir, we set out to create a unique opener with an irate ABC viewer heading into orbit to vent his frustrations!

We also created the on air graphics package and are supporting the show with various visual effects gags throughout the series.

Check out the official site for the latest episode!

DANGEROUS REMEDY (Telemovie)

Set in 1960's Melbourne, Dangerous Remedy is a lavish and dark tele-feature from Eclipse, chronicling the true story of Dr. Bert Wainer's courageous struggle for womens rights and law reform.

In keeping with the style of the era, the opening and closing titles were designed to reflect an old-school optical look, driven by the amazing title track by Guy Gross.

Check out the opening titles here

We also produced over 130 VFX shots for the feature, ranging from the seamless digital removal of modern elements from locations and interiors, to incendiary effects, stunts and more.

Dangerous Remedy is a striking look at an era rarely covered on Australian screens.

JACK IRISH (Telemovie)

Essential media's 2-part telemovie, Jack Irish is headed to the ABC this year. Starring Guy Pierce, this gritty tale brings two of Peter Temple's books to the screen, Bad Debts and Black Tide.

Chroma produced several VFX shots for the production including bullet hits, digital removals CG elements and location augmentations.

BONNY DOON @ ST.KILDA FILM FESTIVAL (Short)

Matthew Saville's recent short, Bonny Doon was selected to open this years St.Kilda Film Festival, having been already part of the Top 100. Probably the most compelling 4 minutes ever filmed from inside a 1989 Tarago GLX, we provided titles and grading duties.

The short was recently awarded Best Comedy from the Improvised FIlmFest

Watch the film here

UNDERBELLY: BADNESS (TV Series)

The Underbelly franchise returns to screens again this year with 'Badness', the first contemporary tale in the long running series. We are returning to produce the eighth itteration of the opening titles, with a more modern, colourful approach to the established UB look. 

Underbelly: Badness will hit Nine later this year.

PLEASE LIKE ME (TV Series)

Starring Josh Thomas and directed by Matthew Saville, Please Like Me is a light-hearted series on the way to ABC later this year.

With mad typography, fun pictures and a great track, the opening titles connect with the opening scenes and are unique for each of the six episodes. As well as titles, we also produced several technical corrections and VFX shots including digital rain.

THE GREAT MINT SWINDLE (TV Series)

Set in Western Australia is the mid-80's, The Great Mint Swindle tells the true story of the Mickelback brothers who schemed to sell a huge fake gold nugget to tycoon, Alan Bond.  We produced several digital effects shots for the series including a car bomb explosion and the gold pour sequence, where the nugget is created.

The show airs on Nine this year.

MISS FISHER'S MURDER MYSTERIES (TV Series)

Based on the hugely popular novels by Kerry Greenwood, ABC's 'Miss Fishers Murder Mysteries' has completed post production with it's first episode getting rave reviews and impressive ratings of over a million viewers!

Set in 1920's Melbourne, this charming series is both a return to form for ABC and a fresh creative direction in a sea of contemporary crime drama. With an huge and incredible cast, gorgeous production design and each episode featuring unique settings and locations, Every Cloud and ABC have created something special that stirs memories of great Australian and British television of years gone by.

Our involvement in the series has seen an already visually rich world transformed by vistas and elements that would have been impossible to achieve within the limits of budget, logistics and schedule. Our unique ability to digitally remove, add or augment elements to live action footage quickly and cost-effectively was a perfect fit for a production with such broad scope as 'Miss Fisher'.

Every Cloud Productions embraced digital effects early in the process, and it quickly became an indispensable tool for expanding production design, usability of locations and many other aspects of the shoot to create a rich and believable world.

We worked closely with the producers and block directors to ensuring each episode had it's own style and attention to detail. Essentially anything that couldn't be dressed out, framed out or cut around was left up to us to deal with - and with so many bustling locations over thirteen Eps, this ended up being quite a task. The team at Chroma produced over 600 shots across 13 episodes, from digital removals and augmentation to CG vehicles, stunt sequences, digimatte environments, dynamic simulation and more that are peppered throughout the series. The previous limitations of shooting period-genre became exciting opportunities to create a layered, cohesive and believable world for the audience to enjoy.

Like the books, each episode is set against a unique environment and it's what has made the show so much fun to work on. Every script revealed new challenges and set pieces, and diverse techniques were required to achieve them within the tight schedule. Ocean liners, circuses, turkish baths, theatres, steam engines and so much more all require a design balance between practical and digital methods to create incredible production value on a broadcast budget and schedule.

Check out the latest episode here along with some clips detailing some of the effects process.

Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries is airing on ABC for the rest of the year, don't miss it!

LAST DANCE (Feature)

Directed by David Pullbrook and featuring Julia Blake and Firass Dirani, Last Dance is a sombre story of cultures and generations. The film was recently made an Official Selection at the 2012 Melbourne International Film Festival.

We provided a wide range of VFX for the feature including some complex removals and fixes, bullet hits, blood effects and CG aircraft.

CHROMA WELCOMES BRET KING (News)

Chroma Media continues to evolve it's services to meet the integrated needs of Australian production, with the addition of in-house sound designer, Bret King to the team.

Bret has already provided sound design and mixing for several features, shorts and TVC's at Chroma and has just begun work on Russian zombie film, METELESTA. Bret's expertise and experience brings even more value to Chroma, as he oversees our brand new, integrated mixing studio.

This boutique facility is ideal for short form and independent productions looking for something a little different in addition to TVC and radio production, featuring 5.1 mixing, ADR/VO facilities, foley, sound design and big screen, uncompressed HD playback. The rooms tight integration with our visual systems are especially beneficial to broadcast design, titles and TVC clients already working with Chroma.

You can reach Bret at the office or email at bret@chromamedia.com

CHROMA NOMINATED FOR 'BEST VISUAL EFFECTS'

We're proud to announce our nomination for Best Visual Effects at the upcoming AFI's for Showtime's Cloudstreet.

This highly visual production featured over 200 shots covering just about every technique in the book from CG aircraft, trains, kangaroos, jumping fish, talking pigs, flipping coins to surreal dream-like sequences like rowing through stars and fields of wheat. With such a wide range of effects and a tight schedule the team at Chroma worked tirelessly to deliver the level of work that a tale like Cloudstreet deserves - so a big shout out to compositor Stuart Elith and CG artists Harsh Borah and Rob Dowling.

It was an honour to be involved with such a great Australian story and a pleasure to see everyone's hard work across the production being recognised by audiences and industry alike.

Cloudstreet picked up 7 nominations all together including: Best MiniSeries, Best Screenplay, Best Lead Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Young Actor and Best Visual Effects.

I'd like to personally thank Matt Saville and Screentime for their commitment, trust and support throughout the project and wish all nominees the best of luck next year!

Check out the trailer here and some VFX breakdowns here.

BROTHERS IN ARMS (TV Series)

Screentime's dynamic telling of the 1980's bikie gangs involved in the Milperra Massacre is coming soon to Ten in a new epic 6-part miniseries, called Brothers In Arms.

We were engaged to design and produce the opening titles, branding and visual effects for the show.

For the titles we chose to go for a western/frontier-style with minimal type treatment, in keeping with the raw, honest approach to the story itself, comprised mostly of stark, compelling imagery rather than footage of cast or episodes.

Eveything from the image selection, edit, typography and grading were kept very simple allowing the catchy title track (Mark Lizotte), powerful images and photography tell the story, with minimal 'screen furniture' and a bleached, parched grade that sits sitting somewhere between faded Super8's and photos from the 70's/80's. Three variations were produced for use across the series.

Check out the opening titles here

In addition to broadcast design, we also produced several VFX shots for the show including digital removals, augmentations and incendiary effects.

Look out for it on Ten later this year.

CHROMA @ SUMMER FILM SCHOOL 2012 (Event)

Chroma is returning once again to present at the University of Melbourne's 'Summer Film School 2012'.

Focusing on the changing role of digital effects in designing, producing, writing and directing contemporary television drama. The course covers the entire range of digital effect techniques and their relationship with each department from production through to post - with an aim to enlighten, excite and energise the next wave of Australian production.

Click here for more info (PDF link).

THE APPLICANT: TROPFEST FINALIST (News)

Tim Dean's short 'The Applicant' has made it through as a finalist at TropFest2011.

Starring Nicolas Bell and Peter Rowsthorn and featuring music by Yuri Worontshak, the film is about a job interview with a difference.... It was a big year for TropFest, with over 700 entries from all over the world competing to get through and we are proud to see it get through to the finals.

I filled the role of co-producer alongside Tim Dean and Chris Corbert, with Chroma designing and producing the character animation and visual effects for the alien creature and the starship interior, in addition to grading duties. The short been officially selected for ShortsFest in Aspen and the 2012 St.Kilda Film Festival.

Check out the film here!

CONSPIRACY365 REVEALS ITSELF (TV Series)

Another series of popular books comes to the small screen in the form of 'Conspiracy365', which is based on the teen novels by Gabrielle Lord.

We're brought in to design and produce the opening titles and provide a wide range of digital effects and technical corrections throughout the first six episodes, with almost 300 shots produced including removals, additions, CG vehicles, location and stunt augmentation.

The series is currently airing throughout the year on the Movie Channel Network.

RUSH FOURTH SERIES ON THE WAY (Series)

You can't keep a good show down!

Having just won an AFI for best drama, Southern Star have announced a third series for Ten's breakthrough police drama, RUSH. With a action-packed new format and the competition fading fast, RUSH aims to keep audiences nailed to their seats with more drama and incredible stunts.

Chroma return for series four, working closely with the production to deliver some of these crazy sequences. As with previous series, comprehensive behind-the-scenes coverage will detail the extraordinary efforts that goes into delivering the effects and action sequences. Stay tuned for the best series yet!