Rob Bredow

Yeah, they really do complement each other.

When we have a shot in The Mandalorian that I talked about in my TED Talk, where we have stop-motion animation combined with real-time computer graphics combined with a real set, and it's seamlessly blended between all three of those live on set where 100 people can compose their shots and make a show inside this both high-tech and low-tech system, which I think that kind of combination is really nice.

That is 100% the right word for it.

It's the magic trick when you could never guess how it would be done.

Even people who've seen the behind the scenes are like, okay, I know they used LED walls.

I know they did digital extensions.

They would have never guessed there was also some stop motion in there.

And as soon as you start mixing the media, it informs what it looks like.

Oh, I mean, the story is king, 100%.

The story has to be the driver.

And the characters, you know, when I first got into visual effects, especially when I first got to the point where I could help design sequences, because we do a lot of, let's say there's something like the Kessel Run or something like that in Solo.

The visual effects supervisor has a lot to do with the design of that sequence, trying to make sure we understand how we're going to approach all those shots.

It would be too easy to lose track of the people when you're just designing spectacular ship shots.

And even knowing that, it's still easy to design in too many ship shots and not enough shots where the action is going to take place on the actors' faces.

As soon as you shoot the whole thing, you realize, oh,

Of course, every time I always get reminded the story is on the actors' faces.

It's not even just their lines.

It's their lines, but it's more their reactions to other people's lines, to what's happening in the world.

And you do need a few shots to keep yourself organized in the geography and to understand the story.

But most of it's on actors' faces, which is lovely because that's what we love to look at.