At NYU Tisch, Create at the Leading Edge of Virtual Production

The Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center is a major component of the institute. This state-of-the-art center is one of the first academic virtual production facilities on the east coast. It will house studios and sound stages specially designed to train NYU Tisch students in industry-standard cinematography and virtual production technology for performance capture, animation, and live compositing and in-camera visual effects. Virtual production, the latest disruptive filmmaking technology in use in Hollywood today, relies on LED panels instead of green screens to display background scenery in real time. Therefore, filmmakers can calibrate and adjust the backdrop imagery of a scene to exacting standards on the fly—and actors can respond naturally to their digital surroundings.

Virtual production is truly meant for the next generation of film and television production. In addition to giving directors and animators immediate control over a production and actors the ability to respond to virtual environments in real time, it makes filmmaking more accessible. Instead of numerous, often far-flung on-site filming locations, a studio to set up the LED panels is virtual production’s only requirement. Furthermore, this reduces the carbon footprint associated with travel to locations and reshoots to capture the perfect shot, making virtual production more eco-friendly. For NYU Tisch students, it also means creating art of significantly higher quality with the same—or fewer—resources than before.