NEW YORK—Vicon and Lux Machina have announced that they have outfitted NYU's Tisch School of the Arts' brand new Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center with next generation motion capture and virtual production technology.

The school is offering a new 36-credit Master of Professional Studies degree in Virtual Production that features training at the Martin Scorsese Center for Virtual Production, which was announced in 2023 and opened this Sept. The 45,586 square foot facility is located on the top floor of Building 8 at Industry City, a 35-acre innovation campus on the Brooklyn waterfront. 

The Center features two double-height, column-free stages, two television studios, state-of-the-art broadcast and control rooms, dressing/make-up rooms, a lounge and bistro, scene workshops, offices, post production labs, finishing suites, and training spaces. Applications for the fall of 2025 are now open. 

Vicon is a pioneer in motion capture technologies and the NEP Group's Lux Machina is a consultancy focused on complex, large scale live shows, film production and installations.

The Center has been outfitted with Vicon’s Shōgun entertainment market software and 40 Vicon cameras, which deliver superior resolution, speed and performance. The combination of the two provides the Center with a state-of-the-art motion capture system for virtual production.

"This project is a natural fit for both Vicon and Lux Machina given our focus on education and empowering the next generation of digital creatives," said David 'Ed' Edwards, Vicon's VFX product manager. "Vicon software and cameras are installed in dozens of universities across the globe for applications spanning virtual production, to sport and exercise medicine, to engineering and robotics research. We're thrilled to play a part in outfitting NYU's world-class Virtual Production Center, which will open the door for tremendous innovation in the field."

Vicon counts the best effects houses in the entertainment world among its users with Lux Machina Consulting being a long-term partner that has worked on pioneering virtual productions for “The Mandalorian”, “House of the Dragon”, “Barbie” and “Masters of the Air”. 

"We love to see the innovation Vicon is pioneering in markerless as motion capture continues to evolve," said India Vadher-Lowe, Lux Machina's head of motion capture. "The ability to mix and match workflows will help us bring to life experiences for customers that were previously limited to the motion capture studio. There's a whole new world of possibilities that we'll soon be able to experience, and we look forward to putting that within reach in the near future."

To learn more, visit www.vicon.com and www.luxmc.com. 

NEW YORK—NYU Tisch School of the Arts has announced that it has selected Industry City for the Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center. The new center will provide NYU Tisch students and faculty with best-in-class production facilities in a unique setting for collaboration and internships at some of New York’s leading film and media companies.

The 45,586-square-foot facility will be housed on the top floor of Building 8 at Industry City, the 35-acre innovation campus on the Brooklyn waterfront. It will feature two 3,500-square-foot double-height, column-free stages, two 1,800-square-foot television studios, state-of-the-art broadcast and control rooms, dressing rooms and makeup areas, a lounge and bistro, scene workshops, offices, and training spaces. 

The center joins The Veterans Future Lab, NYU’s business incubator for members of the military that opened at Industry City in 2017.

The center was made possible by a major gift announced in 2021 from the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation, led by Mellody Hobson, co-CEO of Ariel Investments, and filmmaker George Lucas. The donation established the Martin Scorsese Institute of Global Cinematic Arts, which includes the Virtual Production Center, the Martin Scorsese Department of Cinema Studies, and support for student scholarships. The gift is the largest in the Tisch School’s history.

“We remain so grateful to the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation for the visionary and transformative gift honoring Martin Scorsese,” explained Allyson Green, dean of the Tisch School of the Arts. “The foundation’s generosity has allowed us to begin building the Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center, a place where our filmmakers, actors, dancers, and designers will push forward the boundaries of storytelling. We feel very fortunate to be joining the innovative community of makers and creators within Industry City. The partnerships we forge, along with the inspiring legacy of Martin Scorsese, will make it possible for the Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center to become a place that fuels the development of new and exciting talent in all areas of the cinematic arts for NYU Tisch students and for the New York City film industry at large.”

Widely considered one of the greatest American filmmakers, Scorsese earned two degrees from NYU: a bachelor’s degree in 1964 and a master’s in 1968. He received an Honorary Degree in 1992 and is a member of the Tisch School of the Arts Dean’s Council.

Opening in 2024, the state-of-the-art Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center will offer hands-on training in the latest production techniques. One of the first facilities of its kind on the East Coast, it will further establish NYU Tisch as a global leader in cinematic arts training by pioneering new technology and expanding training and collaborative opportunities in the performing arts and design, the school said. 

“NYU has been a key member of the Industry City tenant community for five years and has been an incredible partner throughout the evolution of the campus,” said Glen Siegel, managing partner at Industry City (Belvedere Capital). “The addition of the Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center is the next chapter in this evolution, enabling students to learn and train alongside experts in their field and allowing IC businesses to shape their future workforce through mentorship, internships, and employment opportunities.”

Home to more than 70 film and media-related businesses, Industry City supports every facet of the production lifecycle. The tenant roster features multiple equipment suppliers, content creators, production companies, lighting experts, set design houses, livestreaming service providers, and content distributors. The 16-building campus offers students opportunities for networking, employment, and collaboration at companies including AbelCine, Buck Media, Lux Lighting, The Garage, and Conde Nast.

LOS ANGELES—Owners of future advanced TVs may one day forget the all too familiar disclaimer before movies—“This film has been modified from its original version...”—at least if the UHD Alliance, CE manufacturers, Hollywood studios and filmmakers have anything to do with it.

The group today announced a collaboration to equip advanced televisions with “Filmmaker Mode,” a cinematic viewing option that promises to one day make such a disclaimer a thing of the past.

“Modern televisions have extraordinary technical capabilities, and it is important that we harness these new technologies to ensure that the home viewer sees our work presented as closely as possible to our original creative intentions,” said Christopher Nolan, the director of “Dunkirk,” “Interstellar” and the “Dark Knight Trilogy.”

“Through collaboration with TV manufacturers, Filmmaker Mode consolidates input from filmmakers into simple principles for respecting frame rate, aspect ratio, color and contrast and encoding in the actual media so that televisions can read it and can display it appropriately.”

Just as various viewing modes available on today’s TVs leverage the digital smarts built into sets to enhance viewing a variety of content ranging from sports to video games, Filmmaker Mode will make it possible for viewers to have an experience that more closely emulates what they have in a theater. The new mode will disable all post-processing, such as motion smoothing, so a UHD TV displays what a filmmaker intended, preserving the correct aspect ratio, colors and frame rates.

LG Electronics, Panasonic and VIZIO will support Filmmaker Mode; however, specific products and rollout plans will be announced at a later date, the UHD Alliance said.

This isn’t the first time Hollywood and CE manufacturers have collaborated on new technologies and experiences for consumers, but it is the first to include leaders from the creative community, the alliance noted.

Filmmaker Mode will be easy for viewers to access. Rather than drilling down through multiple menu selections, consumers can access the mode through a single button push or automatically via metadata embedded in content, according to the alliance. To make it easier for consumers to find, the Filmmaker Mode function name and settings will be consistent from multiple TV manufacturers.

The UHD Alliance’s role in Filmmaker Mode has extended beyond consolidating feedback from filmmakers, studios and CE manufacturers to include polling its members to identify priorities. The alliance also solicited input from the Directors Guild of America and The Film Foundation as part of specification development.

“When Paul Thomas Anderson, Ryan Coogler, Patty Jenkins, Martin Scorsese and Christopher Nolan reached out to the UHDA about extending the cinematic experience into the living room, we were eager and ideally situated to engage in the conversation,” said UHD Alliance Chairman, Michael Zink of Warner Bros.

Hear from Nolan, Scorsese and more of the industry’s top directors on what Filmmaker Mode will offer in the below video.