Bolèro is a USC graduate thesis film produced in 2018. It was directed by Sarah Gross and produced by Annika Dawson. Their VFX supervisor unexpectedly had to quit the project after shooting was finished and I ended up taking over for the post VFX process.

The opening scene of the film has an insanely cool shot of the camera pulling back from a TV screen. It was shot over about sixty takes using a motion control rig to repeat the exact same camera movement. My job was to stitch all sixty of these shots together and rotoscope the different items in the room to make it feel like they were appearing more smoothly.

The main antagonist of the film, “The Reader,” has the power of mind control, and his eyes become clouded over to inform the audience that he is using his supernatural ability. There were many shots like this over the course of the film.

There were several other visual effects worth mentioning, including a futuristic city skyline, several fictional news station graphics/backgrounds, and a bloody chip implant with a flashing LED indicator.

The film almost won a student Academy Award. Hopefully next time!