Marvel VFX Artists Address The Shoddy CGI in ANT-MAN 3 and Explain What Happened
One of the biggest criticisms of Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania was the shoddy visual effects work. It was one of the more annoying aspects of the film because you’d think when you’re dealing with a big-budget tent pole film from Marvel Studios, they would want to deliver the best quality work.
Well, even the VFX artist sthat worked on the film know that this isn’t their best work, and in a recent article posted by Vulture, three artists address the CGI work and why it wasn’t as good as it should have been.
The individuals, who use pseudonyms in the interview, claim to have been “severely understaffed” and faced an “unrealistically short deadline” to finish the film in time for its February debut. They explained that they spent up to 80 hours a week trying to get everything done.
One of the sources, “Jim,” revealed that Marvel ended up taking away several VFX artists from their to have them go work on Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, which was in post-production at the same time as Quantumania. As you know, that film has disappointing visual effects.
Jim said: “For Ant-Man, there were a lot of editorial changes happening toward the latter third and fourth of the project that were just too late. There’s a point of no return. Why certain things were changed, why certain notes were nitpicked longer than they should have been — that’s on Marvel. But it definitely did cause a lot of tension, turmoil, and weight on everybody.”
Marvel Studios has been facing backlash for how they’ve treated these artists and you can read a detailed report on that here. Jim went on to explain that most of these artists keep quiet because they don’t want to “jeopardize their livelihood” with their complaints. They need to work to make money, and if they speak out about how Marvel is treating them, Marvel may dump them.
Jim goes on to explain how he and the other artists are confused about why the studio, which has the resources and deep pockets to produce high-quality films is unwilling to dig deeper and give them what they need to produce great CGI effects. He does have an answer… greed.
He says: “A lot of us are sitting here thinking, ‘The money is there. Why is it not coming down?’ Marvel spending a bit more money to pay more VFX people wouldn’t make that much of a difference for the executives all the way at the top. But if it comes down to them not being comfortable with their bank numbers and us working until burnout, we lose out every time. Honestly, I equate it to human greed.”
Jim went on to share that all of this is the reason why the movie is getting negative reviews. “I think there was so much potential for this story, for the visual effects in general. I think the movie is getting the reviews it’s been getting because Marvel is doubling down as much as possible on constricting quality. They’re squeezing blood out of stones. And we’re out of blood.”
Damn.