Automating the Handmade: Shading Thousands of Garments for Coco

Byron Bashforth, Fernando de Goes, Jacob Kuenzel, Jake Merrell, Athena Xenakis

Abstract:

Coco presented a challenge for the garment shading team. Firstly, the scale of the movie is significant with both the human and skeleton worlds filled with primary, secondary, and background characters. Secondly, the garments speak to a specific culture and our shading needed to be very detailed to convey both modern Mexico and Mexican culture through time. We had to employ new techniques for shading seams and embroidery, optimizing render cost, and handling variation in crowd scenes.

Paper (PDF)