Ingenuity Studios Corrals the VFX in "Horizon"

Water is so familiar to the human eye that there is no margin for error when recreating it digitally. “To recreate water there is a lot more going on than you would think for such an everyday household material,” observes Jaramillo.  “It’s reflective, so you have to consider all of the environment and context of the lighting and the scene around the water. The same patch of water on the ground can look completely different depending on the time of day, how windy it is, and the sediment quality. We had to wrap our brains around how water works at a physical level to be able to then recreate it for as many shots that we did under as many lighting conditions and environmental situations.”  Dozens and dozens of simulation tests were conducted early on. Jaramillo continues, “The whole other side is the topography of the water, like the flow of the surface, how it’s moving and interacting, and how choppy the surface is, which then influences what it’s reflecting.  We had to go on a shot-by-shot level of tweaking the speed, flow and intensity of the river to get to what Kevin wanted.” 

Though much of the story takes place in New Mexico Territory – which included Arizona and part of Colorado - actual principal photography took place in Utah.  “There are different kinds of mountain structures, erosion, plants and climate,” notes Jaramillo.  “We knew from the beginning that it was never going to be a complete makeover to make it look like New Mexico.  The scope on that would have been too big and we would have to altered far too much of the terrain in order to make that happen.  We found a happy midground where we saw what could be brought from New Mexico to sprinkle along the river but made sure what we were bringing wasn’t such a radical departure from the photography.”