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Tomorrowland

[Walt Disney Pictures]

ILM’s primary challenge on Tomorrowland was creating the vast city itself. The environment had to function through three different time periods: 1964, 1984, and 2014.

The team was also responsible for the space launch and Eiffel Tower effects in addition to the robots, jetpack, wheat field, and initial pin experience.

Director: Brad Bird

ILM Visual Effects Supervisor: Craig Hammack, Eddie Pasquarello, John Knoll

ILM Associate Visual Effects Supervisor: Barry Williams

ILM Animation Supervisor: Maia Kayser

ILM Visual Effects Art Director: Thang Le

ILM Visual Effects Executive Producer: Jill Brooks

ILM Studios: San Francisco, Vancouver

Case Study

Tomorrowland

Release Date: May 22, 2015

Tomorrowland was first and foremost a design challenge for the entire creative team as proposed to us by Director Brad Bird. The mission was to design and build a complete virtual city. It needed a 1950’s optimism, free of cynicism, to start. He said Tomorrowland should “feel like the perfect blend between art and science.”

We were tasked to cover three time periods in Tomorrowland’s evolution: 1964, 1984 and 2014. 1964 depicts the city under construction. The 1984 version is the ideal and “fully realized” Pin Experience version, and finally, the dystopian “what went wrong?” version of Tomorrowland in present day 2014.

The final result was a true, functioning version of the place that Walt and Disney Imagineering eluded to in Disneyland’s original Tomorrowland while also incorporating Brad’s and Damon Lindelof’s vision of the city. We even paid homage to Space Mountain – The iconic mountain appears several times in the film.