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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: The Oscar nominations came out today. Our own Wetter FX

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Speaker 2: has nabbed three nominations for the film's alien Romulus Better Man.

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Speaker 2: Now that's the Robbie Williams one where Robbie is played

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Speaker 2: by a monkey and speaking of monkeys, also Kingdom of

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Speaker 2: the Planet of the Apes. Now they're all up for

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Speaker 2: awards for visual effects work. The Oscars are set to

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Speaker 2: play take place in Hollywood, the date the third of March,

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Speaker 2: and the head of VFX at Wetter is Matt Aiken,

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Speaker 2: who joins me, Now, hell are Matt Hi.

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Speaker 1: What a great piece of news to wake up to

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Speaker 1: this morning. Three nominations in the possible total of five.

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Speaker 1: So just an incredible testament to all the hard work

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Speaker 1: that the team's been doing here over the last year.

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Speaker 2: Talk us through the work that went into these films.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so one by one Kingdom of the Planet of

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Speaker 1: the Apes. It's there's a lot of digital visual effects

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Speaker 1: work involved in creating these entirely CG ape characters. What

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Speaker 1: distinguishes Kingdom that at several generations after the last episode

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Speaker 1: in the series, so there's a whole new cast of

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Speaker 1: ape characters, so we had to build them all from scratch.

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Speaker 1: We get to work with new actors doing the reference

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Speaker 1: performance for these characters, and we got involved in a

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Speaker 1: lot of simulation work as well. Another real great girl

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Speaker 1: that we've developed over the last few years is digital

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Speaker 1: water simulation work, so we can create very natural, realistic

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Speaker 1: looking water. So when we've got a digital orangutan character Raka,

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Speaker 1: who has fallen off a bridge and is hanging on

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Speaker 1: for dear life in these rappers with water all swelling

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Speaker 1: around him, his furs wet, his fur is being dynamically

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Speaker 1: moved by the water, that's all simulation work that we're doing.

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Speaker 1: That looks incredibly believable, and I'm sure people are just

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Speaker 1: lost in the peril of the moment and not thinking, Oh,

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Speaker 1: I really like the way that that water simulations probably

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Speaker 1: took up a lot of disk space.

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Speaker 2: That's the trick, isn't it. As so it doesn't look

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Speaker 2: like a special effect. It looks like reality. And I

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Speaker 2: guess your your mokey, your monkey work served you well

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Speaker 2: with the Robbie Williams film Better Man and then of

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Speaker 2: course Alien. I mean, gosh, that must have been a

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Speaker 2: dream come true to do a film like that, because

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Speaker 2: it's always been great what I would like to ask

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Speaker 2: you though, in getting this recognition, how important is it

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Speaker 2: for New Zealand Films to get this And it is

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Speaker 2: good news for the Wellington economy.

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Speaker 1: I would like to think it's it's fantastic news for

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Speaker 1: the Wellington economy. You know, we we're over two thousand strong,

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Speaker 1: most of whom are here in Wellington. It's it's very

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Speaker 1: highly technical work, highly artistic work. It's very satisfying work.

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Speaker 1: I think we make it make a great contribution to

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Speaker 1: the Wellington economy. But we you know, we're tucked away

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Speaker 1: here at the bottom of the Pacific. We we have

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Speaker 1: to work extra hard to attract the work down here.

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Speaker 1: And the best way that we can do that is

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Speaker 1: by delivering work of the highest quality. That's that's our

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Speaker 1: calling card. That's that's what gets us the repeat work

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Speaker 1: on series of films like the Apes film. And so

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Speaker 1: the equality is what is is what's going to continue

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Speaker 1: to to be our you know, our main, our main

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Speaker 1: calling card. And the fact that we've got these three

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Speaker 1: nominations today determined by the Academy, you know that this

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Speaker 1: is the people who are making these nominations are determining

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Speaker 1: these nominations are the leaders in visual effects in the world,

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Speaker 1: you know, the three hundred and fifty odd members of

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Speaker 1: the Visual effects branch of the Academy. That's who's nominated us,

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Speaker 1: and so that they think that we're doing the best

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Speaker 1: work in the world is just fantastic news for us.

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Speaker 1: And if one of these three films ends up picking

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Speaker 1: up the oscar itself, that will be like the icing

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Speaker 1: on the cake. And we'll have our seven, the best

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Speaker 1: seven people from the company who are actually named on

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Speaker 1: the nomination list, that will be dressing up on the

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Speaker 1: Tech taxedos on the day and going to the ceremony

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Speaker 1: in Hollywood at the Dolby Theater. And if some of

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Speaker 1: those people get to go up on the stage and

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Speaker 1: pick up an oscar, that will be a huge moment

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Speaker 1: for us here. We'll all be watching here in Wellington,

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Speaker 1: We'll all be popping champagne.

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Speaker 2: Call of course, you Willy Interesting and thank you so

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Speaker 2: much for your time today. Matt Matt Aiken is the

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Speaker 2: head of VFX at Wetter And if we talk call

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Speaker 2: them after com if we call them after they win

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Speaker 2: the Oscars, we have to call them before they hit

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Speaker 2: the Governor's Ball, because then they'll be in no state

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Speaker 2: actually to give us a decent interview.

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Speaker 1: For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to

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