Outlook 2015: Sony Pictures Imageworks' Pete Travers - Long-term thinking
Pete Travers
Issue: December 1, 2014

Outlook 2015: Sony Pictures Imageworks' Pete Travers - Long-term thinking

Pete Travers
Visual Effects Supervisor
Sony Pictures Imageworks
Culver City, CA
www.imageworks.com

As we look at forecasts for future movies, the vast majority of what we see are sequels and franchises. Some people may look at that as a bad thing, but I don’t see it as bad at all.

Breakthroughs that have occurred in visual effects technologies over the past 20 years have given studios the ability to make any film they want. As late at the ‘90s, there were films that simply couldn’t be made due to plot, character or location requirements that were technically infeasible. 

Guardians of the Galaxy is an example of a movie that would have been very difficult to make 20 years ago, in part, because it takes place almost entirely in space with primary characters represented in CG. Today, we can do any super hero, any action, any location. It has all opened up.

As a result, what you see happening now are storylines that continue past an individual movie. Studios aren’t only making sequels because the first film did well; they are formulating plans to make a series of five, six or seven movies over 10 or 15 years. They can think long term because they no longer have to ask the question, “How are we going to achieve this?”

A company like Marvel is a primary beneficiary of this trend because it has been sitting on a universe of content, with proven popularity, for 30 or 40 years that now can be made into movies. Pandora’s Box has been opened and what you are going to see is more, more, more!