Bringing Nimitz to Life

It's been a while since an official update but we just returned from a great visit to Raleigh and a fantastically positive presentation to the attendees of HonorCon. It was a great deal of fun to be part of the event again and we came back with some useful feedback from the attendees on what we're doing right, what we're not and opened a dialogue on some of the new elements we're exploring in the Honorverse.

One of the key topics of the Presentation this year was Nimitz. We wanted to take the opportunity at HonorCon to explain how the comic version of Nimitz came to be, and we wanted to take the time to share that here with folks who couldn't be present.

The first, most important note is that Nimitz is still work in progress. Arc 2 of the comic will feature an updated version of him and he will continue to develop based on a number of elements including his introduction in any live action piece. The Nimitz in the comic was a snapshot in time of where his development was with our concept team. When developing the character from a visual perspective it was imperative to understand that from a screen time point of view from Nimitz's introduction to the banquet scene in Honor of the Queen would be a very short space of time. It was important for Nimitz to visually look like he had the ability and will to viciously attack and kill from the minute you were introduced to him. He had to look dangerous.

He also had to have fur. We hadn't got that far in the visual exploration when the comic artist needed reference. For us once we had a framework for Nimitz the most important thing was to see him move. Animating a six legged creature is NEVER easy. James Cameron did it in Avatar and the movement of the front two sets of legs are almost identical. With Nimitz we had the additional challenge, we had to have the ability for him to use his front limbs to carry, climb, and manipulate objects. We worked with Blur in Los Angeles to try and find the correct way of animating Nimitz. We showed this exclusively at HonorCon and now we are excited to share it here.

Nimitz is still very much coming to life, in animation and look, but we think this is a great start and the feedback from RWC and the attendees at HonorCon was great.

See Nimitz run!

http://bit.ly/NimitzTest

I'll also put a link up to the front page.

"It was important for Nimitz to visually look like he had the ability and will to viciously attack and kill from the minute you were introduced to him. He had to look dangerous."

WHY?

Cute cuddly suddenly gets vicious like the little green men in Galaxy Quest, it worked then. Nimitz is soft and cuddly until he isn't in the books should work on screen too, a surprize.

Poker

I am with Poker on this part.

I could readily accept "looks dangerous in retrospect", as in you can see it if you know it (second viewing/prior knowledge) or are very observant of details; but blatantly intimidating just doesn't work for the character concept, he can't be a cuddly peacemaker if he is intimidating at first glance.

We will have to see how much the intimidation factor goes down after the fur goes on.

pokermind wrote:"It was important for Nimitz to visually look like he had the ability and will to viciously attack and kill from the minute you were introduced to him. He had to look dangerous."

WHY?

Cute cuddly suddenly gets vicious like the little green men in Galaxy Quest, it worked then. Nimitz is soft and cuddly until he isn't in the books should work on screen too, a surprise.

Poker

See Nimitz run, run Nimitz run:

I don't know if it is the camera angle or that the fore- & mid-limbs are set too close together, but I am having difficulty seeing the interplay between the four front-most limbs.

A longer sequence from the side, maybe panning from above to below the branch would work better for evaluation purposes (this isn't the movie yet after all, less action in the scene is not (yet) a bad thing).

I do dislike the decision to apparently ape the poor choice on Avatar's part of putting in a second pair of forelimbs rather than placing the mid-limbs closer to midway down. Yes, Nimitz moves the front- and mid-limbs in opposite stride as a hexapede should; but anatomically the mid-limbs look like they are too far forward, crowding the forelimbs (again could be camera angle, but that's how it looks to me).

Maybe a look at the configuration of hexapodal anatomy in real-life insects rather than mimicking Avatar anatomy would help inspire something a bit more ... balanced (and no, I don't mean face the back limbs backwards ); in fact insects tend to be a bit more forward-crowding than I would think right for a mammal-analogy (which doesn't have to support an abdomen with back legs rooted in the thorax, only a tail with back legs rooted in the abdomen ).

I would put the mid-limbs just far enough forward that he can balance without tipping on his nose when he rears the front of his body up in centaur mode, not when he holds it parallel with the ground.

My two cents, anyway.

Evergreen Studios wrote:It's been a while since an official update [snip]

One of the key topics of the Presentation this year was Nimitz. We wanted to take the opportunity at HonorCon to explain how the comic version of Nimitz came to be, and we wanted to take the time to share that here with folks who couldn't be present.

The first, most important note is that Nimitz is still work in progress. Arc 2 of the comic will feature an updated version of him and he will continue to develop based on a number of elements including his introduction in any live action piece. The Nimitz in the comic was a snapshot in time of where his development was with our concept team. When developing the character from a visual perspective it was imperative to understand that from a screen time point of view from Nimitz's introduction to the banquet scene in Honor of the Queen would be a very short space of time. It was important for Nimitz to visually look like he had the ability and will to viciously attack and kill from the minute you were introduced to him. He had to look dangerous.

He also had to have fur. We hadn't got that far in the visual exploration when the comic artist needed reference. For us once we had a framework for Nimitz the most important thing was to see him move. Animating a six legged creature is NEVER easy. James Cameron did it in Avatar and the movement of the front two sets of legs are almost identical. With Nimitz we had the additional challenge, we had to have the ability for him to use his front limbs to carry, climb, and manipulate objects. We worked with Blur in Los Angeles to try and find the correct way of animating Nimitz. We showed this exclusively at HonorCon and now we are excited to share it here.

Nimitz is still very much coming to life, in animation and look, but we think this is a great start and the feedback from RWC and the attendees at HonorCon was great.

See Nimitz run!

http://bit.ly/NimitzTest

I fully agree that cute and cuddly with the ability to rip your face off is the way to go. Imagine the impact the dinning room scene would have if most people did not suspect that he could do that. Have a scene earlier in the movie where he gets startled and pops out his claws to get across the fact that he is not a teddy bear, but make him the instantly loveable that he is in the books. I do not feel that there is any good reason to make him frightening. Any Armsman who let that Nimitz into the Protector's house should be shot.

As for the anatomy, I think it looks...off. It looks like a regular 4 legged climbing mammal with a pair of T-rex arms stuck on its chest.

First, thank you for providing this update. I'm glad to see progress!

If Nimitz needs to be seen as dangerous from a storytelling perspective, I agree with the duderino that it seems better to keep it more like foreshadowing. The gym scene where he played frisbee with Honor worked well for me to set up the banquet scene. Maybe having Nimitz accidentally shred the frisbee, lost in his uncomplicated glee of the chase, and then give an "oops" look, could work to convey his physical capacity for mayhem. I also agree that he needs the emotional flexibility to communicate anger. I kind of liked that black hellcat graphic exactly for its scariness. But not as his default affect. And not directly connected to his physical dangerousness ... Until the banquet scene. That should remain a surprise, even if each of the elements is foreshadowed separately. I just hope you can make the screen time to set that stage.

As for Nimitz animated, I agree with the commenters on the running part. There's a certain cartoon gait, where all the legs propel and then the body sails forward while the legs reset forward, that might work. Visually at least, even if you have to fudge the physical kinematics.

That said, I liked the climbing part. He flows up the tree nicely. Was that a picketwood?

The Armsmen are a telling point.

Nimitz in his current form as an intimidating creature should have been banned from access to the Protector and his family by competent Armsmen, no matter what, thus leading to the assassins succeeding.
This would lead to an unwarranted change in the dynamics of the series, what with the death of the Protector, his heir, the Titular Character of the story arc ...

The alternative is to assume that the best team of Armsmen on the globe, presumably as (if not more) elite than the secret service team guarding the US president, would let someone who has just issued threats against the united states walk into his presence with her pet velociraptor not even on a leash.
Pet cat? Maybe, grudgingly; pet tiger? Hell no!

Nimitz needs to be able to at least fake the 'cat part, else the apparently perceived need on Evergreen's part to make him believable in the assassination scene will instead make the entire setting and outcome of the assassination scene unbelievable.

crewdude48 wrote:I fully agree that cute and cuddly with the ability to rip your face off is the way to go. Imagine the impact the dinning room scene would have if most people did not suspect that he could do that. Have a scene earlier in the movie where he gets startled and pops out his claws to get across the fact that he is not a teddy bear, but make him the instantly loveable that he is in the books. I do not feel that there is any good reason to make him frightening. Any Armsman who let that Nimitz into the Protector's house should be shot.

As for the anatomy, I think it looks...off. It looks like a regular 4 legged climbing mammal with a pair of T-rex arms stuck on its chest.

Also: as dca notes the climbing part works much better than the running.
And as to if that was a picketwood: probably. A bit too many and too short side branches for my taste but none of them are below the lowest set of connecting branches IIRC, so it could well be one; not one that fits my mental image of 'em, but we ain't going with my creative license here.

Thank you, hvb, for putting into story structural terms what I reacted to viscerally. After reading the post, I jumped to alternative solutions that fiit my understanding of book canon. But that ignores Pokermind's essential question of why Nimitz has to be seen as dangerous. There's probably a good reason why they are so insistent on this point.

So what is it?

Why change one of the most beloved characters in the Honor Harrington series?

Turning Nimitz into a visual threat makes as much since as dressing Adolf Hitler as Glenda the Good Witch of the North in the Wizard of OZ to make him sympathetic in the movie The Bunker. Nimitz's harmless appearance is a main plot element in the books. Mentioned were getting him into the dining room past security, and Cordelia would have any obvious threat eliminated on sight. Having Nimitz look dangerous logically ruins two main scenes.

So again I ask why?

Well it's your money, most fans will view the result, but trashing a beloved character like Nimitz will lead to resentment, bad comments, and perhaps bad reviews, just saying. Think of the marketing to toddlers, nice cuddly Nimitz or the vicious Devil cat, which do you think will sell more?

Poker

OMG what the hell was that? A devil Spawn? Seriously? Where is the nice catlike cuddly stinker we all love and cherish?

And am I the only one who didn't see the mid-feets?

Warder