Production has started on an $8.6 million IMAX space documentary tentatively titled Hidden Universe.
The giant-screen film is being produced in Chile and Australia (Melbourne) by production house December Media and Swinburne University of Technology’s Centre for Astrophysics and Supercomputing.
"We’re making a film about what lies within the gaze of the new generation of telescopes,” producer Stephen Amezdroz, who is shooting live-action scenes, said in a statement. "Hidden Universe will reveal the incredible knowledge that is being revealed as never before, the incredible links between our own nature and the rest of the universe and the possibility of life on other planets – giving audiences a dramatic new view of the cosmos.”
The documentary will also employ computer-generated imagery, remastered telescopic images and cutting-edge new data to create simulations of the cosmos and its beginnings. December Media will create 3D images of celestial structures such as the Whirlpool Galaxy, and the Crab Nebula.
Russell Scott of Swinburne 3D Productions at the Centre is directing the $8.6 million film, which has received the backing of Film Victoria and will be distributed by IMAX specialist MacGillivray Freeman Films.
Production ends in October before the film's anticipated release in March/April 2013.
Contact this reporter at bswift@www.if.com.au or on Twitter at @bcswift.