The Great Wall - Environment

In a tentpole movie called 'The Great Wall' it is important to get the actual Great Wall of China asset right! Early in the project I did some setup and experimenting to see how we could approach surfacing the wall, essentially proof of concepts which could be refined. We found some tricks to get the bricks always aligned horizontally while the wall twists and turns over terrain for a realistic look. There was a smaller section of wall built as a set so we matched the look to this but 90% of the time when you see the wall it is full CG or heavily extended.

Daniel Gagiu did the bulk of the surfacing on the wall, maintaining multiple sections and doing close up details. The wall had weapons built into it to defend against the hordes of attacking Toa Tei creatures and was almost a character in itself.