LA-based effects company Digital Domain will begin recruiting local VFX artists next week to work on Alex Proyas’ Paradise Lost.
The company is in the throes of setting up a local office to support the film, which will spend eight weeks shooting (including motion capture) at Fox Studios Australia before a lengthy 72 weeks for post-production and visual effects work. The film stars Bradley Cooper and is based on John Milton’s poem about heaven and hell.
Digital Domain public relations project manager Tim Enstice did not respond to queries about the planned Australian operations. However, it is understood that a Digital Domain team, including head of production Jody Madden, is expected to arrive in Sydney later this week as part of the recruitment drive.
The company, which has worked on films such as TRON: Legacy and X-Men: First Class, is searching for local candidates with skills in the areas of: animation, creatures, lighting, modelling, pipeline, rigging, texturing, compositing, FX, look development/shading, matte painting, production, and technical direction.
The NSW government first revealed in July that Digital Domain would set up a permanent Australian office to support Paradise Lost. The government expects the production to spend $20 million on visual effects, creating over 200 jobs specifically in the area.
Digital Domain is likely to receive the recently-doubled 30 per cent federal government subsidy for effects and post work conducted in Australia (although Paradise Lost, as an Australian film, would be eligible for the 40 per cent Producer Offset).
Digital Domain will be in direct competition with several local companies which also count the Hollywood studios among their clients such as Rising Sun Pictures, Fuel VFX, and Animal Logic.
Further information about Digital Domain’s Sydney recruitment drive can be found at digitaldomain.com/careers/.
Contact this reporter at bswift@www.if.com.au and on Twitter at @bcswift.