A local company is making waves on the silver screen — literally.
After working on several major motion pictures, Colonie’s Aquatic Development Group (ADG) supplied a specialized wave system that generated the open water shots in Ang Lee’s “Life of Pi.”
The film, based on Yann Martel’s 2001 novel, depicts a young boy shipwrecked for 227 days, living on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger. The majority of the film takes place on the ocean, and there are several major storm scenes.
Vice President of Business Development for ADG David Keim said he was contacted by one of the film’s executive producers about two-and-half years ago to talk about creating a special wave generator system. The company has worked on several other films before, including 2003’s “Master and Commander” and 2006’s “The Guardian.”
“We’re pretty well known as being the go-to people for waves,” Keim said. “We’re the largest wave generation company in North America.”
For “Life of Pi,” the company had a short two months to produce and design the high-tech wave equipment from scratch in Colonie and then ship it to Taiwan, where part of the movie was shot. ADG created a $1.3 million, 24,000-square-foot system with a dozen 150-horsepower wave generators and one 125-horsepower air compressor that were placed in a 300-foot wide by 900-foot long pool. The waves are generated by taking extremely large volumes of air and releasing it into a “caisson,” or a watertight chamber. The caisson fills with water in the pool, and then the air is blasted down and out into the pool through an opening at the caisson’s bottom, creating a wave.
Timing for the wave valves is key, and is electronically controlled to create the realistic effect.
“(It can) replicate everything from raging storm conditions to a gentle swell you have on the ocean in calm seas,” Keim said.
Though the film uses CGI, Keim said the all of the water scenes with waves were done in the wave pool.
Art Long, the “Wave Guru” and field engineer at ADG, was sent to Taiwan to supervise the wave equipment installation and handle the system. Although he was supposed to stay for two weeks, Long came home almost three months later. He said one of the biggest challenges to the job was the short schedule and long hours.
He also had to make sure he got the exact waves Lee was looking for.
“The man is always in pursuit of perfection,” Long said.
Even after working behind the scenes, upon seeing the final result Long was searching to find evidence the film was in pool, but couldn’t find any.
“It turned out better than I had anticipated. They did an outstanding job of whatever magic editing techniques they do,” Long said. “I was looking for technical errors and I couldn’t find any. I was impressed.”
ADG is also involved in several different applications for wave generations, including in zoo and aquarium exhibits and in water parks like the Camelbeach Mountain Waterpark in Pennsylvania.
“We’re fortunate in that our business does generate fun, whether we’re building a water park or creating waves for a motion picture,” Keim said. “In the end, everything we do provides entertainment for families.”
Keim said the best part about the entire project was that it was finished on schedule and was able to create the types of waves Lee was looking for.
“The greatest pleasure taken away is sitting with your family at the theater over the weekend and watching the movie your company was responsible for in a large part,” Keim said. “I get that I’m biased, but it’s honestly one of the best movies I’ve seen in a long time. It was extremely well done, start to finish.”