Indians are playing a big role in Hollywood now. No, it is not because of the Biden administration’s wokeism and Hollywood’s diversity agenda. Indians are emerging as an inseparable part of the VFX in Hollywood simply because of their talent, skills, and hard work. On the other hand, Bollywood fails to tap into the Indian VFX industry.
What is VFX?
Visual effects, or VFX, is a process by which imagery is created or manipulated as inputs in the live-action shot in filmmaking and video production. Of late, visual effects have been added to video production with the use of computer-generated imagery (CGI). This allows affordable and simple animation effects to be supplemented in filmmaking.
So, if Khaleesi’s dragons- Drogon, Rhaegal, and Viserion in the Game of Thrones seemed almost real and left you flabbergasted, you can attribute it to some brilliant use of Visual effects.
How Indians are dominating VFX in Hollywood
Indians are increasingly becoming a vital part of the visual effects used in Hollywood flicks.
Be it an adventure movie like Thor: The Dark World and Avengers or more intimate projects like The Shape of Water and The Handmaid’s Tale, Hollywood is increasingly tapping into Indians specializing in VFX.
Why Hollywood is looking at India?
Indian VFX experts offer two great advantages— affordability and high-quality work.
Also, Indians excel at communication in the English language and this makes it easier for Hollywood to tap into Indian skills.
Harsimmar Singh, who has worked on Marvel Cinematic Universe’s (MCU) projects like Avengers, Thor: Ragnarok said, “Indians are known for their hard work, dedication and cheap labour which attract the industry to hire them. Most of the people can speak and communicate well with clients and bosses, which gives them an upper hand compared to other countries.”
Indrajeet Sisodiya, an industry expert, spoke about the growing role of Indian visual effects artists. He said, “It has been happening gradually over the years as Indian artistes slowly started getting accepted for overseas VFX study courses leading them overseas work opportunities. Others who are immensely talented in VFX in India get jobs offered directly from overseas studios and that’s another way of entering Hollywood.”
In fact, many international VFX studios are now opening up their branches in big Indian cities like Mumbai and Bengaluru. Apparently, no one wants to lose out on exciting Indian talent in the visual effects industry. Thor: The Dark World, for example, was outsourced to Prana Studios Ltd. (Mumbai) and Bengaluru-based Mr. X contributed to The Shape of Water.
Bollywood not tapping into VFX
While Hollywood has tapped extensively into Indian VFX experts, Bollywood and the Indian film industry on a whole hasn’t really opened up to the concept.
Apart from some movies like Baahubali, Robot/Enthiran, the Dhoom series and Krrish series, and some regional language films, Indian filmmakers haven’t shown the willingness to make VFX a substantial part of their projects.
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There is this illusion that names and brands sell in the market. I mean we have seen many movies with superstars and loose, meaningless scripts. So, producers think that they can funnel a lot of money and cast an expensive actor for the lead role. After that, they don’t want to spend on anything.
Then, there is this issue of scripts too. In the past few years, Bollywood hasn’t produced any notable superhero movies or any movie that involves extensive use of animation and other visual effects. So, there is not much scope left for VFX experts to display their skills.
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