Superstar Shah Rukh Khan really meant it when he remarked,”I want to open my own VFX studio” in a recent interview to a business daily.
Located at Khar in Mumbai, Red Chillies Entertainment Pvt. Ltd. the entertainment company owned by King Khan recently kickstarted its VFX division ‘Red Chillies-VFX’.
Shah Rukh who is currently shooting in Kuala Lampur for Farhan Akhtar’s Don commented â€?VFX is the way of the future. I personally believe that with all the colour, charm, passion and the lyricism that already exists in hindi cinema, the way to enhance the romance of films is going to be through the addition of VFX in our technique of cinema. Technology can only better the process of story telling and narration. It is a tool which the largest film-making nation in the world cannot afford to ignore!”
“Also, it is necessary to develop our own system as somehow the understanding of VFX in an Indian way is important because it will help us retain our USP of films and not end up being a reflection of the western way of thinking when it comes to effects. VFX is the next big addition to our films and needs to be nurtured and developed if our films have to truly get international in the near futureâ€? added Khan.
The operations and creative direction at Red Chillies-VFX shall be managed by the VFX Supervision trio of Arjun Mitra, Haresh Hingorani & Keitan Yadav who have been into the VFX industry for more than a decade now and have many successful films, TVC projects and some prestigious awards to their credit.
The trios’ last stint was as part of the managment & creative team at Eagle 3D where they worked closely with two of Red Chillies productions ‘Main Hoon Na’ and ‘Paheli’ and various TVC projects. Both the films featured a good amount of well executed VFX.
Speaking to Animation ‘xpress, ‘Red Chillies-VFX’ Keitan remarked,”We have worked closely with Shah Rukh on a couple of his home productions previously and we really gel well. . Shah Rukh is a maestro when it comes to understanding technicalities such as timing and camera angles and has a great understanding of Visual Effects. He is in-sync with the latest techniques and technologies as well. Red Chillies-VFX will strive at doing cutting edge VFX work and try and raise the bar of Indian Visual Effects”
“The studio is an independent entity and will work on projects from across the local and International markets as well as Red Chillies Entertainment’s own projects. We will however play the quality game and not the number game, with the focus on doing projects that offer a creative challenge” added Haresh Hingorani.
�This is a whole new adventure!� exclaimed Arjun Mitra. �Our objective is to provide the best facilities to deserving talent, and work for the best films… and obviously have a whole lot of fun and sleepless nights in the process!�
“Technology giant HP is providing end to end solutions for our studio. Our team size is currently close to 25 – 30 artists and technicians and we are looking to ramp up to a team strength of 100 in a couple of years time” he added.
Currently the studio is working on the VFX of Farhan Akhtar’s ‘Don’ and also on “Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd.”
