Jumanji: The Next Level Visual Effects Breakdowns

VFX Online December 29, 2019, 2:05 am 3k Views

Jumanji: The Next Level Visual Effects Breakdowns

Jumanji: The Next Level is a 2019 American action adventure comedy film directed by Jake Kasdan and written by Kasdan, Jeff Pinkner and Scott Rosenberg. It is the second sequel to 1995’s Jumanji, following 2017’s Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, and the third installment, overall, in the Jumanji franchise. The film stars Dwayne Johnson, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Karen Gillan, Nick Jonas, Alex Wolff, Morgan Turner, Ser’Darius Blain, and Madison Iseman, reprising their roles from the previous film, alongside newcomers Awkwafina, Danny Glover, and Danny DeVito. This time, the adventures continue in the fantastic world of Jumanji, where nothing is what it seems to be. The players must return to the dangerous game; however, their characters have exchanged with each other leaving us the same heroes but with different looks. Moreover, they must find out where the rest of the players are in order to beat Jumanji again.

Jumanji: The Next Level was theatrically released in the United States on December 13, 2019 by Sony Pictures Releasing under its Columbia Pictures label. It has grossed $364 million worldwide.

Jumanji: The Next Level Making Images

Jumanji: The Next Level VFX by Rodeo FX

After Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, Rodeo FX is now part of The Next Level as well.

Throughout the project, we were tasked with a variety of work, across many sequences in the film. We created a variety of visual effects, from animation, to creature work, to digidoubles, environment, and extensive FX simulation.

Our work can be seen throughout the entire film, including the opening shot of the film.

Some of our favourite work was creating photoreal CG Camel assets, animating and integrating them into a large variety of wide, medium and close up shots.

Part of our greatest accomplishments was our Oasis city work, where we created a full CG flyover shot with photoreal CG buildings, CG crowd, and extensive DMP work.

Within Oasis, we were tasked with the intense fight sequence, where we created full digidouble animation and CG take over from the live actors.

Some of our most gratifying work can be seen in the Magic River Waterfall sequence, where we animated our photo real CG Horse asset, and other CG digidouble heroes jumping into the water, then through animation, creature fx, muscle system, hair grooming and FX water simulation, created a shot where the CG Horse whips their head around like a classic shampoo advertisement.

We were once again tasked with creating a CG Hippo in the Hippo’s Back sequence with water simulation and interaction, and our team also created a rather large CG Snake for the Snake Surprise sequence that grabs a CG Digidouble of Oberon, which we animated, lit and comped.

In the Plane Drop sequence, we created the CG plane and added animation to our main digidoubles characters falling into the sand dune with blasts of sand thru FX simulation.

As was previously done for the last movie, Player Menus were created and updated for each character, getting new Strengths and Weaknesses for the story line.

The Magic Map reveals were ours once again, where the maps and locations appeared for each level. One shot in particular had a significant upgrade where we added a camera motion which zoomed in on one of the main locations. Our Matte Painting department had to fully recreate that map over some 2.5D layering to get that 3D space feeling.

We were the main vendor responsible for the massive Ice Wall sequence, creating a huge fully 3D asset incorporating many passes of FX simulation for snow.

We worked extensively on the Berry Tree room, where we were tasked with creating the actual large tree, the berry Soul transfer and the magic water effect. The team approached that effect via some multi 3D FX passes lit and comped.

Once again, Rodeo FX is proud to have had the chance to have contributed to this challenging and entertaining film.

Jumanji: The Next Level VFX by The Third Floor

Back for round 2 with Jumanji: The Next Level, TTF sets personal records ablaze in their latest venture into visualization. Armed with three cities full of artists working on over 30 sequences, we couldn’t be more proud of the team!

Director: Jake Kasdan
Release Date: 13 December 2019 (USA)

Overall VFX Supervisor: Mark Breakspear
Overall VFX Producer: Tom Elder Groebe

The VFX are made by:
Method Studios (VFX Supervisor: Glenn Melenhorst)
Rodeo FX (VFX Supervisor: Alexandre Lafortune)
Sony Pictures Imageworks (VFX Supervisor: Jason Greenblum)
Weta Digital (VFX Supervisors: Ken McGaugh & Mark Gee)
DNEG (Stereo Supervisors: Ritesh Aggarwal and James Rees)
The Third Floor