I’m sure many of you are hoping, like I am, that James Cameron won’t pull a post-Titanic hiatus again and fly off to Pandora to film a couple of documentaries on the area like he did with Ghosts of the Abyss and Aliens of the Deep in lieu of doing his next major theatrical blockbuster. Luckily, Pandora isn’t a real place, so there’s that in our favor. But with Cameron, you know that he’d find some way to pull it off if he really did want to go there with some cameras.
Anyway, Syfy recently did an interview with James Cameron at the Santa Barbara Film Festival where the uber-director was being honored with the Modern Master Award and they discussed his post-Avatar future. Among the possibilities are the oft-mentioned Battle Angel and the obligatory Avatar II: “We’re still figuring that out,” Cameron said. “I love Battle Angel. I’ve always loved Battle Angel, but a second Avatar
film is a possibility, and I’ve got a couple of other films that I’ve
developed over the last few years as well. So it’s all still up in the
air.”
Regarding a second Avatar, Cameron went on to say: “It was embedded in my original pitch to the studio that part of the
kind of business model for this is that we create all these digital
assets. We essentially create a world. It exists in hard drives when
you’re done with the movie. And you can re-create it very quickly. When
physical sets get struck, their value plummets from a $2 million set to
zero in one day. But our equivalent $2 million of development for a
digital set, it’s still there. So the idea was maybe we don’t make so
much money on the first film, but we make more on the second film.”
So while he’s still mulling over plans for his next project, he did say that it won’t be another 12 years before we see it on screens. You can click over to Syfy for more from the King of the World.
14 comments
Those digital assets will lose value the second they release a new 3D Max plug-in or whatever that does something new. So, like maybe 3 months? The offset is that processing/rendering will likely take less time on the next one.
"So the idea was maybe we don't make so much money on the first film, but we make more on the second film." Hahahahaha…yeesh!
Enjoyed Avatar for what it was, but I'd prefer something new instead of a follow-up.
AssHats, you're obviously a, experienced CGI professional. Thank you for your educated opinion on this matter, now please go back to playing Assassin's Creed.
So Asshats, how do you figure a simple plug-in or whatever instantly makes the modeling and design work of hundreds (if not thousands) of virtual locations obselete? The offset in the tens of thousands of man-hours is huge and not simply a savings for processing and rendering. I'm no fan of Avatar or Cameron films in general, but when Cameron says the digital assets offset will be enormous he knows what the hell he is talking about. This is a guy that understands digital technology and how it affects the bottom line better than anyone.
A Jacques Cousteau-style documentary film series feature Cameron exploring various alien planets? You know you'd watch it
I want a Xavier: Renegade Angel film on Pandora
Stop calling it "SyFy". You're only encouraging them.
Pandora vs Thundercats ftw
I vote Aliens 2. We can discount the other two sequels and can start fresh!
@#5: Okay, I was being facetious. But digital assets do have a shelf life and if he waits too long to pick up the Avatar story again he will need to deal with that issue. I'm familiar enough with cgi to have spotted a lot of artifacting and rendering issues through-out the movie – particularly in the forests, where most of the CG was carrying the heaviest load. Stuff that will stick out like a sore thumb in a few years. @#4: Never played Assassin's Creed – is it any good? I heard the controls were a bit shitty on PC.
TRUE LIES 2, MAKE IT HAPPEN, JIMMY.
"I'm familiar enough with cgi to have spotted a lot of artifacting and rendering issues through-out the movie – particularly in the forests, where most of the CG was carrying the heaviest load."
Interesting… I'm not going to toss virtual dicks around with credentials, but I'll call complete bullshit on that. Avatar may not have been the deepest movie experience ever, but the cgi was definitely the most convincing and flawless.
Real fans of james cameron are waiting for "Battle Angel"l nor another movie.i think!
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