#ANTIdiaRy

Working closely alongside director Yoann Lemoine, a.k.a. recording artist Woodkid, Framestore were called upon to create a wide range of visual effects-heavy shots for Rihanna’s incredible journey. ‘From her humble childhood in Barbados through the pressures of fame to becoming a global megastar, we follow Rihanna's path through life so far’, said Framestore co-Executive Creative Director Aron Hjartarson.

‘Yoann had a really cool take on the whole project and brought a great sense of design and style to it. He also has a background in computer graphics and music, so had a very clear idea of what he wanted to accomplish', said Murray Butler, co-Executive Creative Director. ‘His unique vision for the eight rooms on this journey encompasses the worlds of art, music and fashion, and required just the right level of nuance and technique from the whole Framestore team in order to pull it off’.

The VFX work was wide-ranging, calling for a collation of Framestore’s global talent to handle concept design, on-set VFX supervision, telecine and all 2D and 3D work. ‘The challenges were myriad and varied’, said Butler. ‘Tasks included beauty work and set augmentation across all eight films; replacing a prop gold crown with a CG asset; a CG stream of blue ink spilling out of the tattoo artist’s eyes and nose; CG insects; and the creation of a mysterious portal made from a breathing material, that Rihanna passes through at the end of Room 3’.

Framestore’s global teams were involved from an early stage, helping plan specific shots for the shoot. Matt Pascuzzi, Framestore’s Shoot Supervisor and VFX Supervisor on the project, said of the work: ‘We were fortunate enough to have a highly collaborative role on the project. It was such a pleasure to work this way with Yoann, and meant we were able to design a lot of the more complex VFX shots from the ground up. With some spots going from conform to finished product in a matter of days, having an agile, multi-site pipeline allowed us to pool resources from the Framestore offices across LA, New York and London, making it a true team effort’.

Indeed with all eight films shot, edited and completed within a five week turnaround, #ANTI-diaRy proved a perfect challenge for Framestore’s global pipeline. With multiple versions of each spot being worked upon in tandem across offices, and daily virtual reviews under the exacting eye of both Lemoine and agency, there was simply no room (or time) for error.

The resulting film series prove something quite extraordinary, shedding new artistic light on the whirlwind career of Rihanna. The combination of seamless workflows and a strong, collaborative creative journey create a distinct film series for one of the most-talked about music releases of recent years, and proved a project that Framestore is extremely proud to have worked on.