Blog

How a joy riding skeleton in a Lamborghini Reventon helped us win the Deus Ex: Human Revolution job

Not so long ago we found ourselves in the twilight world of biotech firms, super-enhanced humans and black opps teams hell bent on murder.

Our task was to ensure ex SWAT hard man Adam Jensen – hired to protect scientists to carry out their dubious trade in human experimentation – was given a makeover worthy of his stature as brutal high tech killer out to save the world.

Just to clarify, Adam Jensen isn’t real hes a fictionalised digital hard man in a game called Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Our job was to CGI the shattered backdrop surrounding Adam Jensen and that’s what eventually appeared on all the Xbox covers for the global launch. It was a satisfying conclusion to some hard graft on our part involving a CGI skeleton joy riding a Lamborghini in a gothic twilight world.

Deus Ex Human Revolution

Lamborghini Reventon

The original idea was to use a Lamborghini Reventon model we built in CGI and race it through an animated cityscape. I wanted to raise the profile of my studio and show potential clients I was more than just a high end automotive stills photographer.

I wanted a promo piece to show off a CGI world we were able to build from scratch. But there was a problem; I wasn’t happy with the idea. I called a friend of mine, Tony Chance, who just happens to be a Hollywood storyboard artist (I kid you not) who’s worked on such blockbusters as Mission Impossible, American Beauty and X-men.

He suggested we change the cityscape to a ruined cathedral, give the set a gothic twist and – oh – make the joy rider who’s stolen the Lamborghini a skeleton. Tony liked the idea of the promo so much he decided to storyboard and art direct it himself.

So I managed to prise Tony away from his day job at Shepperton studios for a week or so to kick off the project. We then took a few months ? working on and off between jobs ? building the CGI sets, the skeleton and the ruined cathedral. After we were happy with the sets, we then added the Lamborghini Reventon. Tony also had the idea of the scraping stone at the beginning signifying a skeleton climbing from his tomb. Nice touch.

Reventon Gargoyle

With the job finished I hawked the promo around town, London that is, and was hugely satisfied when we were asked to work on Deus Ex pack art & promo material. No small thanks to Tony Chance’s storyboard/ art direction.

Some 18 months later I’ve still got a soft spot for our joy riding Skeleton in the Lamborghini Reventon and I’ve never played Deus Ex: Human Revolution. But a teenage son of a friend of mine says Adam Jensen is a first rate killer.