ANIMAL RESEARCH

Weta Digital animation supervisor Aidan Martin explains the visual research conducted for Marcus and Theodore…

“We have a pretty extensive library of ape and chimp reference to draw upon,” states Martin. “Part of the brief for Marcus was that he wasn’t a hyper-intelligent chimp but an animal in a strange environment. We looked at chimps that were looking into cameras and staring at mobile phones. Because it was interesting to see that they had some concept that these were special objects that made noises at them, but didn’t necessarily know what they were for. For Theodore we had recently wrapped up work on Disney’s Lady And The Tramp, so we had built up a small library of dog references. We had some great Japanese noodle commercials that featured a white fluffy dog in space which we referenced heavily for the cute factor.”