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            Pixel Magic completed over 200 visual effect shots for the Dreamworks / Paramount feature, “Hotel for Dogs”.  The film tells the story of two kids who stumble upon an abandoned hotel and transform it into a home for their dog, as well as countless other strays in the city.   As the sole visual effects vendor and production on-set supervisor, Ray McIntyre Jr.’s team completed a variety of visual effects shots.  The majority of the work centered on CG building extensions and dog duplication. 

            Although the film takes place in the heart of a bustling downtown metropolis, it was filmed in the Los Angeles area.  To achieve the director’s vision of vast skyscrapers, numerous shots required the addition of BG city plates, extensions of existing buildings, CG buildings or a combination of the above.  One of the more difficult CG building extension shots was done as a result of the fire that destroyed a portion of Universal’s back lot in early 2008.  After being mostly destroyed by the fire, a large façade being used as the base of the hotel exterior needed to be completely reconstructed in CG in order to match to shots photographed prior to the accident.  Since this shot was now using a CG building, the director had more creative license to alter the composition.  Originally planned as a locked camera, the final shot featured a large, dramatic tilt down from the top of the hotel towards the base with additional green screen people added walking around. 

For practical reasons there were a limited number of dogs that were available for the production, however, the script called for hundreds of dogs in some of the wider shots.  Due to budget and time constraints, CG dog duplication was not an efficient solution.  Instead, McIntyre opted for a more practical approach.   Using approximately 10 different dogs at any given time, numerous plates of greenscreen dogs were photographed and used by the compositor to achieve the large numbers the director required.   Furthermore, with 10 different dogs come 10 different trainers which needed to be removed from the plates.  As such, each shot was meticulously composed and photographed using more than one clean background.  This allowed a more cost-effective procedure for removing the trainers using rotoscope and paint work, rather than 3D recreations of backgrounds.