Endhiran, Jeans, Pandavas, Athadu, Sainikudu has one in common; Alagarsamy Mayan

Mr. Alagarsamy Mayan is the Global Delivery Head at VenSat Tech Services Pvt Ltd. Based in Chennai (India), he oversees the Creative and Technical operations for all VenSat projects across all locations, and is responsible for overseeing the further enhancement the company’s offering in digital imaging.

A globally recognized Animation industry expert, Mr. Mayan has led several creative operations at Silverline Animation, Mahindra Satyam BPO, Land Marvel, Pentamedia and other organizations over the course of his 18+ year career.

Mr. Mayan has the distinction of executing more than 200 Visual effects feature films and over 90 feature films with onsite visual effects direction. He has won many awards for his visual effects skills: Jeans - National Award for best Visual effects movie, Pandavas – National Award for Animated movie, Athadu – Nandi Award for best Visual effects movie, Sainikudu – Nandi Award for best Visual effect movie. Mr. Mayan is a member of CII Committee on Animation, Chennai Chapter and holds a Masters Degree from Adam Smith University; Massachusetts.

CG Today : It is indeed an honor to have a conversation with you, Mr. Alagarsamy; it’s an immense pleasure to have you and thank you very much for making time for this interview.

Alagar : Thank you.

CG Today : Mr. Alagarsamy, you are the Global Delivery Head of VenSat Tech Services Pvt. Ltd. Could you tell us more about the “House of Imagination and Intelligence" (Hi2) being set up at the Vensat studios?

Alagar : The ‘House of Imagination and Intelligence’ (Hi2) – a necessity in our business, this will support the business to develop and compliment the projects with the right expertise by having a highly experienced and multi-talented team aligned with every project a) to guide and mentor the animation artists with creative inputs, technical expertise and process methodologies, b) establishing a robust and nimble-footed production environment and c) to offer a complete suite of animation services seamlessly.

CG Today : Vensat Studios is one of the studios that worked on the Visual Effects of the film ‘Endhiran’ (The Robot). Can you please share with us the role Vensat Studios played in making this multi million project?

Alagar : In ‘Enthiran,’ which was also called Robot, VenSat worked on more than 300 complex shots including a car chase, a train fight, and most of the climax sequences. In the pre-climax and climax, we worked on head replacement shots and complete Computer Graphics (CG) creation of the robot. The most interesting and challenging part in this phenomenal project was the creation of the face and body, as we had to be match them with the existing characters (actors). VenSat as a team took this as a challenge and ultimately brought great finesse to the scenes, as is obvious from watching the movie.

CG Today : Endhiran’s effective result is due to a successful collaboration of Indian Artists Studio, Legacy Effects, Vensat Studios and 12-15 other effects studios along with a few freelancers around the world. This collaboration has directly saved time and improved quality. Is collaboration a good thing in film-making? Is it going to be the future? And how is Vensat prepared for it?

Alagar : I personally feel that the collaborative approach in film-making is a healthy approach. But, these collaborations work only for big-budget projects. VenSat is open for discussions to work in collaboration with producers/ production houses.

CG Today : Can you tell us about the Light Stage Domes that were used in Endthiran to add detail to the CGI faces?

Alagar : The Light stage domes is a very popular scanning technology. We received the high-quality scanned images with textured images as input.

CG Today : Can ‘Endhiran’ be defined as a milestone for Indian VFX films?

Alagar : It is certainly a milestone for the Indian Film industry as it has brought an international class of VFX to the Indian audience.

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