Siggraph Presentation - Art Directing For ICVFX | Video

This SIGGRAPH talk broke down our work art directing virtual environments for Lucasfilm’s live-action Star Wars series, including The Mandalorian, Ahsoka, Boba Fett, and others. We covered how our virtual art department (VAD) team used Unreal Engine to help directors, DPs, and production designers visualize and plan environments months before shooting.

The core process involved:

• Virtual location scouts where filmmakers placed cameras and adjusted lighting inside Unreal.

• Designing full scenes, not just sets, often starting with concept art and moving into layout, pre-lighting, and visualization.

• Daily and weekly reviews that mirrored traditional art department workflows.

• Turnover packages that passed creative intent to production and post teams.

We emphasized the value of treating the VAD as a design-first tool, bridging pre-production and post with clear handoffs. Many of the final shots match our real-time previs 1:1, proving the value of involving key creatives early.

We also covered technical challenges: managing assets at scale, review pipelines, and cross-department collaboration. Every project required a mix of photogrammetry, model scans, set extension planning, and layout logic to work within physical production limits.

Key takeaway: this workflow isn’t about making sets faster, it’s about designing smarter, reducing uncertainty, and aligning creative decisions before anyone steps on set.