Framestore

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  Framestore built a photorealistic computer-generated version of Audrey Hepburn for a Galaxy chocolate advert, 20 years after the actress had died. The London studio recreated her face using techniques normally reserved for feature films. That same studio has helped shape the visual effects in many major film franchises, largely unnoticed by audiences.

  How did a company capable of digitally reviving a dead film star's face also end up shaping some of cinema's science fiction and fantasy franchises? What mergers, offices, and awards built the reputation behind that single unsettling advert?

• 2. Founders And Innovators

  ›

  William Sargent, Sharon Reed, and three friends started the studio in 1986. Tim Webber joined two years later, in 1988, and led its push into digital film and television production. He developed Framestore's virtual camera and motion rig systems.

  Mike Milne started the company's computer-generated imagery department in 1992, adding animation work to what had been a smaller range of services. Five years later, Framestore acquired the Computer Film Company, known as CFC, one of the UK's first digital visual effects businesses. CFC had been founded in London in 1984 by Mike Boudry, Wolfgang Lempp, and Neil Harris. Lempp later became chief technology officer at Filmlight, and Harris went on to Lightworks. Its first film, released in 1988, was The Fruit Machine, made using early morphing techniques.

  That merger gave Framestore new tools for digital film scanning, compositing, and output, technology it would soon carry into offices well beyond London.

• 3. Growing Into A Global Studio

  ›

  In 2004, Framestore opened its first satellite office in New York City, aimed at advertising work. An office in Iceland followed in 2008; it has since closed and reopened independently as a local visual effects company called RVX. By 2013, Framestore had added offices in Montreal and Los Angeles, and the following year it launched its own production arm.

  Framestore's early feature work included The Tale of Despereaux, delivered with Universal as the studio's first feature animation project. In 2000, the team completed Europe's first digital intermediate for the film Chicken Run. Nine years later, Framestore contributed scenes to Avatar, and it completed four British feature films as production projects, released in cinemas between 2009 and 2010.

  Framestore employs roughly 3,000 people, with 1,000 based in London and 1,500 spread across studios in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Montreal, Melbourne, and Mumbai. In November 2016, the Shanghai-based Cultural Investment Holdings Co bought 75 percent of the company for 112.50 million pounds. Framestore opened a third US location in Chicago in April 2017.

  That scale and new ownership put Framestore in a position to compete for some of the largest visual effects contracts in the film industry.

• 4. Blockbuster Visual Effects

  ›

  The studio worked on several Harry Potter films throughout the 2000s, but one of its most demanding assignments came in 2013, on the film Gravity. Tim Webber served as the film's visual effects supervisor, and the techniques he and the Framestore team developed took three years to complete.

  Four years later, in 2017, Framestore created around 300 shots for Blade Runner 2049. That same year, the studio worked on Darkest Hour, directed by Joe Wright. Working out of its Montreal facility, the team built historically accurate backdrops for 85 shots, including battle scenes.

  Framestore has also worked on the anthology series Black Mirror, creating props such as a 60s-style spaceship seen in the premiere of its fourth season. Its project list in the years that followed included Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Beauty and the Beast, and Paddington 2. In November 2020, Framestore acquired Deluxe's former creative assets, including Method Studios and Company 3, expanding its visual effects and post-production reach.

  That expanding portfolio set up a run of industry awards still to come.

• 5. Awards And Recognition

  ›

  In 2008, Framestore won its first Academy Award for Best Visual Effects, for The Golden Compass. The studio also picked up the BAFTA Award for the same film that year. The studio was nominated again the following year for The Dark Knight, and again in 2010 for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1.

  Gravity brought Framestore its two biggest wins to date. It won the BAFTA for Best Special Visual Effects at the 67th British Academy Film Awards. It also took the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects at the 86th Academy Awards. Five years later, in 2018, the studio won both the Academy Award and the BAFTA for Best Visual Effects, this time for Blade Runner 2049.

  Across its history, Framestore has received two Scientific and Technical Academy Awards and 14 Primetime Emmys. In advertising, the studio has won Cannes Lions, British Television Advertising Awards, Clios, and D&AD awards, among others. Its research and development team eventually spun off to form the technology company Filmlight, which received four Scientific Academy Awards of its own in 2010. In 2020, Framestore won a BAFTA TV Craft Award for Special, Visual and Graphic Effects, for the HBO and BBC series His Dark Materials.

  That same skill for hire also extended into advertising, where the studio's boldest experiment meant recreating a face audiences thought they would never see again.

• 6. Advertising And Digital Faces

  ›

  Body doubles, motion capture, a facial-performance system called FACS, and rendering software called Arnold all played a part. Framestore combined them to rebuild the digital likeness of Audrey Hepburn for a Galaxy chocolate advert. Framestore has also collaborated more broadly with companies and advertising agencies to build trade characters.

  The advert drew press attention for its technology and for the ethical questions it raised about using someone's likeness after death for commercial purposes. As the same tools spread further across film, television, and advertising, similar questions are likely to follow.