Iron Man 3

In IRON MAN 3, our hero Tony Stark faces a new villain; The Mandarin. Cinesite completed over 100 shots in just eight weeks for the Walt Disney Pictures production, ranging from composites to digital matte paintings and full CG environments.

Cinesite’s main body of work features in a battle at a Marina between Stark (Downey Jr.), James Rhodes (Don Cheadle) and the “Extremis” villains. Several shots were filmed against bluescreen, with Cinesite creating or augmenting the environment.

Foreground live action footage of a gunman firing down towards Stark and Rhodes from a gantry was subtly warped and manipulated to ease it into the required angle, fitting with the final shot perspective. Cinesite created the crane gantry in CG, adding muzzle flashes to the villain’s machine gun, warping his hand and arm to give a realistic ricochet to the gun recoil.

In the final composite, practical SFX smoke plates were also added with some secondary animation for additional motion; spot light beams were generated in Nuke.

• Release date: 03.05.2013
• Studio: Walt Disney Pictures
• Director: Shane Black