Starring director Neil Blomkamp, Sony’s undistributed high-octane footage of race car driving in a sneak shot at Gran TurismoSony Pictures and PlayStation Productions’ feature adaptations of the best-selling racing video game, on Wednesday during the CES press conference in Las Vegas.
Scheduled to hit theaters on August 11, Gran Turismo used the lens with Sony’s Venice 2 which uses a Rialto expansion system that effectively separates the sensor from the camera. This allows filmmakers to place cameras in very tight spaces inside cars, like the filmmakers above. Top Gun: Maverick used this camera system to place these small camera devices inside the fighter.
Based on the true story of Jann Mardenborough, the Columbia Pictures film is described by the studio as the story of the fulfillment of the last wish of a teenage Gran Turismo player whose gaming skills have won a tournament. Nissan competition series to become a real professional racing driver. It stars Archie Madekwe as the teenager and David Harbor, Orlando Bloom, Djimon Hounsou, Darren Barnett, Daniel Puig, Josha Stradowski, Thomas Kretschman, and Geri Halliwell-Horner. Blomkamp said he was attached to the project because the main character was a real person with a “super emotional” story. Also, “I love cars and this was an opportunity to take high spirited car photos in a way that got me really excited.”
Describing the approach he and cinematographer Jacques Jouffret took to the film, the director explained: “We used Rialtos inside cars and cockpits in spaces you wouldn’t normally use. get IMAX resolution sensor. So the Lamar prototype cars that we were shooting, in the third scene in the movie, had a tiny cockpit and we needed to be able to pan left to right, right to left to shoot the racing scene, then neutral, it’s all right up to the actor. So we have these little sensor blocks with little lenses right next to the actor.”
He added that outside shots also benefit from the small and lightweight system. “Because they are so light [we could] put them where we can really simulate the corners of Gran Turismo,” he said. “And finally, the third person POV behind the car, we had a small Rialto camera on one arm which gave us a very unusual POV.”
Also speaking at the event, Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group president Sanford Panitch reported that Sony has more than 10 film and television projects in development and production with PlayStation Productions. And their quote undiscoveredof the $400 million global box office, he said, “we’re pretty excited about the direction the genre is going.”
Head of Playstation Productions, Asad Qizilbash, said that when tailoring game IPs for cinemas, “we carefully considered how we appeal to both longtime game fans and newcomers alike. . We’ve balanced that out with undiscovered and I think we’ve been very successful. … Now with Gran Turismo, we feel it also has all the elements to do just that. It has this amazingly compelling, true story. And it’s got the same emotional on-screen experience as riding gives you, and racing gives you. And for PlayStation, we really wanted the spirit and energy of the game to be captured. Neill is the perfect filmmaker to do that.”
Sony also made game announcements at CES. PlayStation VR2 is on sale on February 22, and more than 30 games including Gran Turismo 7 will be available. Sony also announced the development of a PS5 controller with accessibility in mind, codenamed Project Leonardo.
Highlighting interest in the automotive space at CES, Sony Honda Mobility, a joint venture between Sony and Honda that aims to develop electric cars, revealed its brand will be called Afeela as it rolls out its first EV prototype. on Sony’s CES stage.
The person making this announcement was Epic Games CTO Kim Libreri (who also happens to be an Oscar-nominated VFX vet). “Sony has been a great partner for over two decades of use [Epic’s] Unreal Engine to make great games and more recently TV shows, concerts, etc,” he said. “We are working closely with them to help deliver a leading connected automotive experience, not only in safe and intuitive communication, but also in entertainment.”
The CES show floor opens on Thursday.
