Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse and Wardenlight Studio: Behind the Scenes
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse made waves last year as the first animated feature film in the Spider-Man franchise. It's cutting edge, progressive style earned it a Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film and an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Wardenlight Studio is responsible for some of the great work that is Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. We were lucky to ask them some questions that take us behind the scenes. First, let's introduce Bastien and Jessica- two integral members of the team.
Bastien :
Bastien Grivet a Swiss Art Director, concept artist and composer based in the South of France. In 2013, he co-founded Wardenlight Studio with his wife, Jessica Rossier. It's a company specialized in visual development for AAA productions around the world. He designed the environments in Call of Duty: Black Ops III, Shadow of War and Elder Scrolls Online cinematic, Love, Death and Robots: The Witness, and more recently, the Academy Award winner Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse.
Jess :
Jessica was born in Switzerland in Montreux.
She started her artistic career in 2007 as an event and wedding photographer. In 2009 she moved with her companion Bastien Grivet in Montpellier in south France and started a new career in video games as a concept artist. She worked as a freelancer with Bastien and on different productions such Coca-Cola, Elder Scrolls Online, the movie Upside Down, Louis Vuitton…
In 2013 she co-founded Wardenlight Studio with her now husband Bastien Grivet. Today she’s the CEO and the Co-Art Director of Wardenlight Studio which is a company specialized in visual development for video games, cinema and advertising. The studio can now count among their productions some famous titles such as Shadow of War, Call of Duty Black Ops III and Spider-man into the Sider-verse.
Take us to the beginning, how did Wardenlight Studio happen?
After few years working for amazing studios in France and around the world (Ubisoft, Treyarch, Activision, Blur…) we decided to create a studio in order to take bigger productions and hire people to work with us when the situation needs it. That’s how Wardenlight Studio was born, in 2013, and for six years now the adventure has never stopped.
How did you get informed of Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse?
We met Alberto Mielgo in Portugal during the THU festival in 2015. He said that he wanted to work with us and we were so happy, but no more info at this time… When we came back at home, he sent us an email saying that he was working on a cool project with Sony Picture Animation about Spiderman…
Did your team immediately say yes or was is something that needed discussed?
At first we thought “oh… another Spider-man?“ And then we read a small part of the script and our jaw just dropped on the floor. We said a huge YES! Also, we were ready to work on any project with Alberto, we’re big fans of this incredible artist and he’s one of the nicest guys we had the chance to meet and work with. He’s so professional and respectful with his art team, we wish every artist to work one day with someone like him.
How did the work begin?
We started with our usual technic, on the shot where you can see Mary Jane speak about the death of Peter in front of the church… and it was a total failure, we were too confident in our past techniques and we didn’t understand what Alberto wanted at first.
But, it was amazing because he immediately sent us some video feedbacks and he explained what he really wanted and started to teach us his techniques. In a certain way, we were paid to learn from the best masterclass of our lives… And for three months we learnt to paint like him and we finally succeeded. We were a part of the team.
How did you manage such a large project being all over the world? How was communication?
It worked very well actually. As we’re located in France, we received the video feedbacks in the morning and we sent the artwork during our evening so that Alberto could see them in the morning in LA. It worked very well.
Was Wardenlight Studio in charge of a specific piece and how did that work?
We were in charge to paint on Photoshop a lot of backgrounds from Brooklyn and Miles Morales’s school. It was supposed to be used as it is and projected on 3D volumes, a bit like what you can see in the third episode of the Netflix’s Love Death and Robot show: The Witness, directed by Alberto- where we used the same technique. We also worked on part of the subway.
Can you explain the different departments of the company and how it all worked?
It’s really simple, we’re always just us two, creating environments. If we need some precise skills such chara-design or a huge amount of environments we are happy to hire our highly skilled friends to the rescue! But for Spider-man it was just Bastien and I, painting background environments.
What would you say is the biggest hurdle you had to overcome?
On Spider-man, it was the fact that we had to learn everything from the beginning. As we were used to using a lot of shortcuts like 3D, photo… Here, we needed to go back to the basics and embrace what we were supposed to be: artists. We had to paint everything with only few references from Alberto and sometimes with just a square as a brush. It was one of the best and biggest challenges of our career at this time.
When the directors changed was your work effected? How did you move forward with a different vision?
Yes it was tough for us at first. After a whole year and a half to work in a specific style and then change to another way of creating, it was a new start… But it happened when our mission was almost done so we had only few months to make the switch then let the Patrick O’Keefe’s amazing team finish the movie. It was amazing to see how much those guys were inspired by our work and just finished the movie as it was, with their own touch. The result was beyond our expectations.
When did you realize this was going to be a success? Or did you?
When we saw the first animation test. We thought
Oh my god, we’ve never see something like this before, it’s gonna be crazy…
But there was no certitude, when you’re creating something new like this. You just keep doing what you have to do and don’t think about success. You just do what you think is good, you trust your art director and you cross your fingers. When we saw the first wave of awards won by the movie it was like an awakening for us, like “Oh! Wow people like it, holy crap it worked!“
How has worked changed since its release? Or has it?
It changed everything for us. The phone rings everyday and the studio’s mailbox is full but our main benefit was for our own production. We just released our first mobile game and we had the pleasure to use some of the techniques we learned and mix it with our old tricks. It's worked very well and we can see that people love it!
Have any upcoming projects you’d care to share?
Yes! We released our new co-production with 1492 Studio and Ubisoft called Is It Love? : Fallen Road, it’s a new universe for this already famous mobile game license (42 millions players).
Nobody expected us in the visual novel game field but, that’s why it was so fun to do! And now we’re working with Bad Robot Games and Quantic Dreams on new amazing projects. And Bastien and I also organize a small festival for concept artist that happens twice a year, called ART WEEKEND, we’re about to do the seventh edition in May and it’s gonna be crazy as always, you can find more info on the website or into the two latest editions of Firestarter Magazine.
Do you have any advice for ambitious artists?
Always keep your passion alive.
This is a tough industry where sometimes you will get hurt as artists, so always find what keeps your passion at the top because it will save you when you’ll be uninspired, sad or at the lowest. Work hard and always get your inspiration from the best!
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