As the final season of The Americans drew near, FX came to us looking for a promo that would ramp up the anticipation, and we were eager to get our ideas out there. Our initial pitch included 8 tease concepts ranging from live action-based to full CG.
Each cloth star was individually stitched to the base of the flag so they could carry different physical properties. The stars on the real flag were more rigid than the base fabric, so I used similar physical constraints for the simulation in Marvelous Designer, which worked well and caused very natural creasing and pinching. The stripes were separated by fabric seams to create visible creases and I modeled piping and stitch lines along the edges. Lastly, I created fine displacement maps from photos of the actual flag to extract additional crease details to match the reference.- Said Josh
And here is more about how the team at Bigstar
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After creative back-and-forth, the idea of the American flag being taken over by the Soviet flag not only peaked our interest, but evolved into a unique production. The simplicity of the two flags gave us a chance to tell the story in multiple layers, where we could touch on the duality of Elizabeth and Philip, as well as the Soviet Union and America.
The fun and challenging side of production was coming up with a way to create this transformation with a new and exciting approach. The Team was dedicated to the idea of capturing as much as possible in camera.
In a great team effort, FX undertook the shooting of the flag and BigStar shot custom ink mattes with elemental directors, Susi Sie, who captured the microscopic effect of the fabric bleeding out and transitioning. Combining these live-action elements with CG created at BigStar developed a seamless end product that would best represent the concept as a whole.
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