While using all the right tools is key, working with characters and narrative plotlines naturally calls for intricate captures of expressions and emotions. Qually explains, “A game like LA Noire is built around reading someone’s face, so you can tell if they’re lying or not. There are degrees of how much it actually worked. And when I played The Last Of Us, which is very emotional and engaging, there were times I just had to put the controller down and gauge the drama. So much of that came from the intricacies and interactions of performance capture, and, of course, writing and directing.”
Qually, who’s a mocap player on 2017’s horror flick It, was presented with a whole new playing field for his skill set. “We had nine kids in, which was new for us,” he describes, “For one scene, we took two contortionists and had them suspended from a stunt beam and folded them together. We sowed one girl’s upper torso into the other girl’s legs, and then we did the same with the other torso, so that they were running together. We wanted Pennywise to be very putting-off but still very human when you saw it.”
