How Industrial Light & Magic Helped Resurrect ABBA with Digital ABBA-Tars (rollingstone.com) 46
"After they broke up four decades ago, ABBA famously refused all kinds of money for reunion ABBA-tars and performances," writes Rolling Stone.
"But a few years ago, British entrepreneur Simon Fuller pitched an idea that piqued the Swedish superstars' interest..." "We got sort of turned on by the thought that we could actually be onstage without us being there," ABBA singer-songwriter Benny Andersson says over Zoom.
The band, along with Fuller and their producers Ludvig Andersson (Benny Andersson's son) and Svana Gisla (music-video producer for the likes of Radiohead and Beyoncé), initially explored reproducing themselves by hologram technology, but that didn't pan out. They finally realized a grander dream: ABBA Voyage, the 196-show concert residency at newly built ABBA Arena in London's Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park that begins May 27. Made with help from George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic, digital avatars (also known as ABBA-tars) embody the stars in their Seventies prime, performing a 22-song set alongside a flesh-and-blood backing band assembled by James Righton of the Klaxons and including U.K. singer Little Boots on keys....
The band and the team and ILM realized early on that an existing venue wasn't going to work for the residency. There are 1,000 visual-effects artists on ABBA Voyage, making it the biggest project ILM has done, according to Gisla (and this is the company behind Star Wars, Marvel, and Jurassic Park). The roof of ABBA Arena was reengineered three times to fit the complicated lighting system. Where many concerts might use only one lighting rig, this one uses 20.
There was a lot of work put into making the ABBA-tars — which, the band stresses, are not holograms, but digital versions of the members that look like real, physical performers. Not too long before the pandemic put things to a near-halt, the four members of ABBA met from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day, for four and half weeks straight, performing for 200 cameras and a crew of nearly 40 people while wearing motion-capture suits. They posted up in a sound studio within the Swedish Film Institute, playing all the songs they had carefully curated for their first show in 40 years. "It was really a pleasure for all of us," Andersson says.
Back in London, body doubles emulated the performances, but with a younger energy. "We are sort of merged together with our body doubles. Don't ask me how it works because I can't explain that," Andersson continues. "If you're 75, you don't jump around like you did when you were 34, so this is why this happened."
Producer Ludvig Andersson adds: "We hear often, 'This is the dawn of a new era in live entertainment.' I think that's an incorrect statement. I don't think it is. This is unique."
"But a few years ago, British entrepreneur Simon Fuller pitched an idea that piqued the Swedish superstars' interest..." "We got sort of turned on by the thought that we could actually be onstage without us being there," ABBA singer-songwriter Benny Andersson says over Zoom.
The band, along with Fuller and their producers Ludvig Andersson (Benny Andersson's son) and Svana Gisla (music-video producer for the likes of Radiohead and Beyoncé), initially explored reproducing themselves by hologram technology, but that didn't pan out. They finally realized a grander dream: ABBA Voyage, the 196-show concert residency at newly built ABBA Arena in London's Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park that begins May 27. Made with help from George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic, digital avatars (also known as ABBA-tars) embody the stars in their Seventies prime, performing a 22-song set alongside a flesh-and-blood backing band assembled by James Righton of the Klaxons and including U.K. singer Little Boots on keys....
The band and the team and ILM realized early on that an existing venue wasn't going to work for the residency. There are 1,000 visual-effects artists on ABBA Voyage, making it the biggest project ILM has done, according to Gisla (and this is the company behind Star Wars, Marvel, and Jurassic Park). The roof of ABBA Arena was reengineered three times to fit the complicated lighting system. Where many concerts might use only one lighting rig, this one uses 20.
There was a lot of work put into making the ABBA-tars — which, the band stresses, are not holograms, but digital versions of the members that look like real, physical performers. Not too long before the pandemic put things to a near-halt, the four members of ABBA met from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day, for four and half weeks straight, performing for 200 cameras and a crew of nearly 40 people while wearing motion-capture suits. They posted up in a sound studio within the Swedish Film Institute, playing all the songs they had carefully curated for their first show in 40 years. "It was really a pleasure for all of us," Andersson says.
Back in London, body doubles emulated the performances, but with a younger energy. "We are sort of merged together with our body doubles. Don't ask me how it works because I can't explain that," Andersson continues. "If you're 75, you don't jump around like you did when you were 34, so this is why this happened."
Producer Ludvig Andersson adds: "We hear often, 'This is the dawn of a new era in live entertainment.' I think that's an incorrect statement. I don't think it is. This is unique."
Re: (Score:2)
Slashdot died a long time ago. It was purchased in order to push corporate, prounionization and left leaning propaganda
It was purchased to push cryptocurrency stories. Literally. So only one of those things. The rest of that stuff is just posted because we will argue about it and that generates clicks.
Re: (Score:3)
Nah. It is also paid to push pro union garbage
Says the cheerleader for Chinese worker slavery.
You will of course forgive me if I am not interested in your ideas on unions.
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
Likewise. If you want to tithe a potion of your salary to union bosses then go ahead and do it. But shut the fuck up about it.
You can eat two dicks in the morning, and eat two dicks at night.
That is the difference between your type and mine.
What, you try to silence people for having opinions which run counter to yours, while I only want to silence people who are inciting violence? I noticed that.
Re: (Score:2)
What capitalist revolution killed billions?
The industrial revolution, which is still killing people today. 7 million people die every year from air pollution alone, or about 1 in 8 deaths worldwide.
Air pollution also explains how you could ask such a stupid question [pnas.org].
There is some overlap between those air pollution deaths and other lists of deaths, for example the 1.9 million people who die from work-related causes each year [who.int]. A substantial portion of those people are killed by the undesired outputs of industrialization.
Another capitalist revolution
Re: (Score:2)
What capitalist revolution killed billions?
The industrial revolution
When the Iron Curtain was lifted in the 1990s, it was clear that the commies had a much bigger problem with pollution than the capitalist West.
The worst polluters in the world today are China's SOEs (state-owned enterprises).
Re: (Score:2)
The worst polluters in the world today are China's SOEs (state-owned enterprises).
And the country buying the most shit from China is the USA. So?
Re: (Score:1)
>> What capitalist revolution killed billions?
> The industrial revolution, which is still killing people today. 7 million people die every year from air pollution alone, or about 1 in 8 deaths worldwide.
While I agree with you re the downsides of the Industrial Revolution, most of the people who die from its effects would never have been born without it. Famine used to keep the population down. The wealthy, of course, were able to feed their children and this selected for people who went after wea
Re: (Score:1)
" And the country buying the most shit from China is the USA. So?
Yep. One of the downsides to capitalism, and economics in general, is that people mostly buy the lowest cost toasters. When toasters (and much else) can be made cheaply in China and brought here cheaply, then companies who moved production offshore made out like bandits, and the ones who tried to stay went bankrupt.
In retrospect that wasn't the best idea, but who would anticipate a pandemic?
Not that great? (Score:4, Interesting)
Interesting idea, but this:
https://youtu.be/BP5mdfrLEkU?t... [youtu.be]
looks worse than Unreal 5.
ILM seems to be firing on Rogue One energy, well after the advent of deep fake technology.
Too bad, but maybe working for George is just too sad for the zoomers?
Delicious sonic fentanyl (Score:1)
Unique? (Score:2)
Producer Ludvig Andersson adds: "We hear often, 'This is the dawn of a new era in live entertainment.' I think that's an incorrect statement. I don't think it is. This is unique."
That's silly. Of course others will do the same thing. They might in the process even preserve the career of a band with talent.
sort of turned on (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:1)
Good work if you can get it. Imagine making money from stuff you did 50 or more years ago and not being Disney.
ABBA also working from home (Score:3)
Just phone it in, like the rest of us.
Re: (Score:3)
Been to any modern concerts lately? They are all just phoning it now.
I Feel Sorry for Artists Today (Score:2)
Artists today basically have to compete with every musical act that has ever lived. I don't consider myself much of an ABBA fan, but I suspect that a show put together by ILM, in its own specific venue, using younger actors as "body doubles," is probably pretty good. It certainly is likely to get far more publicity than some random band struggling to get attention on Youtube. No matter how good that new band might be.
That's certainly not something that bands had to compete against when I was younger.
Re: (Score:1)
ABBA has some tribute bands going around.
Saw them in 1979 (Score:2)
I saw Abba in their prime on their tour for Voulez-Vous [wikipedia.org]. An amazing show. It was a long time ago.
I also remember Björn being emphatic that he would rather people remember them as they were and not see them as they are now. This was circa 2000, when there were rumours of them turning down $1 billion to do a reunion tour. I'm not sure I want to see them either, real or synthetic.
...laura
Vocaloid (Score:2)
This is nothing new. Asian countries have had virtual idol concerts for over a decade now. Heck, I myself went in 2016 to a global Vocaloid concert, originally performed in Japan and transmitted to movie theaters all around the world, watching it in real time.
The only difference here is that the virtual performers are photorealistic instead of anime-like, but that's it. Everything else is exactly the same.
Re: (Score:2)
Also, I've seen the vocaloid performances, and it's really just a pepper's ghost playback of the animated character. In many cases, you can often detect how crappy it is when the animated idol is not keeping up with the real live band. It really takes you out of the experience.
Re: (Score:2)
ABBA is actually made up of real people, and real facial maps.
That doesn't change what the show is doing. It's still animated 3D puppets. The only difference is the source of the data file describing how every point in the puppet moves: manual input by animators vs. captured. In fact, one could use the map files captured from ABBA members and use them to animate Vocaloid characters, or the other way around, and those would not only work but be quite amusing to watch.
It really takes you out of the experience.
That's bound to happen in ABBA-animated shows too unless they add some kind of feedback loop to slowdow
Re:Vocaloid (Score:4)
They have been doing this in Vegas with Elvis for years. Just project a film of his dead ass performing a concert and have a real band playing in the back ground, and you get "Elvis Lives!"
When I saw this I laughed so hard I almost hurt myself. The King is Dead! Quick, I have a new way to milk his dead ass for money! Human has no shame.
Zuck licking his lizard lips (Score:1)
so lemme see if I understand this correctly (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Sad isn't it? I mean people enjoying something that you don't enjoy or care about. What a waste. Surely no one will ever do this with any other act or band.
Re: so lemme see if I understand this correctly (Score:1)
Lipstick (Score:2)
Sorry, you can put lipstick on an old fart, but it's still an old fart. There's lots of great footage of them in their prime. Why watch a computer simulating a person simulating them, when you can see the real thing?
Oh yeah, I'm one of the old farts who is supposed to go for this nonsense. No thanks.
The tech here is amazing (Score:1)