Spotlight on Cyrille Bonjean, The Mill VFX Supervisor

Cyrille Bonjean began his career as a Compositing Artist, before becoming a Compositing Supervisor, working on film sets and as a stereoscopic consultant. Today, he is a Visual Effects Supervisor at The Mill.

With more than 20 years of experience in the visual effects industry, he has worked across a wide range of French and international productions, from comedies and thrillers to fantasy and creature-driven films. His credits include Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, The Intouchables, The Life of Adèle, Asterix and Obelix, La Rafle, Good Manners, Tlamess, The Animal Kingdom, and more recently Troll 2.

His work has received international recognition, including a César for Best Visual Effects for The Animal Kingdom, shared with Bruno Sommier and Jean-Louis Autret, as well as the Best Special Effects award at the Sitges Film Festival for the same film.

• What does your job entail?

My job is very versatile. I see myself as a technical and artistic advisor to the Director.

It starts with the script. I read it, study it and annotate it directly, identifying the different types of effects that may be needed: practical effects, make-up, set extensions, compositing, or fully digital effects.

I then meet with the Director and the Producers so we can discuss their ideas and decide together how we are going to achieve them. From there, I prepare the budget and, if everything goes well, we move into pre-production.

I work with all the different Department Heads, such as the Production Designer, the Stunt Coordinator and, of course, the Cinematographer. We need to make sure that everyone understands what is going to be done on set and what will be created or completed later.

Depending on the project, some shots may be created almost entirely on set, while others will require a lot more digital work. For creatures in particular, it is often a combination of practical effects and visual effects. We define, together with the Director and Producers, what can be done physically on set and what will be handled digitally.

During the shoot, I supervise the VFX shots and make sure that we capture everything we will need later. This can include scanning the set, capturing lighting and spatial information, taking measurements, or simply making sure that all the necessary elements are there for the artists.

Then comes post-production. I work with the different teams and Supervisors, from CG and animation to FX, environments and compositing. My role is to make sure that everything comes together technically and artistically, while constantly exchanging feedback with the Director.

So I really have an overview of the whole process, from the first reading of the script to the final image.

• What is the project you have worked on that you are most proud of?

I have many projects that I love for different reasons. I am fortunate to have worked on very different types of films, from intimate art-house films to big action comedies.

I still have a soft spot for fantasy and monsters. I have had the opportunity to work on several films where creatures played an important role, and The Animal Kingdom was a particularly special project for me.

I find the film visually stunning. It is a beautiful story with captivating performances, and the visual effects support the characters and the story rather than simply being there to show off the effects.

We worked for a long time on this film, and our teams worked on more than 150 shots. We created the digital versions of the Birdman and the young chameleon girl, among other things.

The project was also important because it allowed us to push ourselves further. And the film received a lot of recognition internationally. It won the Best Special Effects award at the Sitges Film Festival, and we received the César for Best Visual Effects with Bruno Sommier and Jean-Louis Autret. The film was also recognized at the Digital Creation GENIE Awards, including awards for Best Visual Effects and Best Character/Creature.

For me, though, the most important thing is still the film itself and the work we did as a team. The awards are a wonderful recognition, but they are also a recognition of everyone who contributed to the project.

• What has changed for you since receiving the César?

It's a recognition from the industry, and that is always important. What makes me particularly happy is that it is also a recognition of the work done by the team.

And then, obviously, going to the César ceremony is something you dream about when you are a kid who loves cinema. So that was quite something. 🙂

• What would you say to a teenager who would like to pursue the same career as you?

“Give yourself the means to try it if that’s what you desire.”

I think that is probably the most important thing. Nothing was really guaranteed for me either. I come from the countryside, my grandparents were farmers, so working in cinema was not exactly an obvious path.

But if you want to do something, you have to give yourself the chance to try.

• What was the most challenging project in your career?

There isn’t one specific shot. There have been many projects that kept me awake at night! 🙂

That’s the problem when I create or prepare things: my mind doesn’t switch off. Especially at night. It tries to anticipate all possible scenarios.

Among the complex shots I’ve worked on, I remember a shot in La Rafle, another in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and some more recent shots by my artists in The Animal Kingdom.

More recently, Troll 2 was also a very interesting challenge. The film involved a giant digital creature interacting with its environment, which meant that we had to think not only about the creature itself, but also about everything that reacts to its presence.

These are the kinds of details that can make a shot very complex. You cannot just create the creature. You have to make everything around it react to its presence as well.

• What was special about working on The Animal Kingdom?

One of the things I really liked about the film was the way we approached the creatures.

They were not simply digital characters added afterwards. We worked closely with the practical effects teams to decide what could be done physically and what needed to be created digitally.

For Émile, for example, our work was mainly about completing the make-up and prosthetics digitally. For Grenouille, we created a full digital double so that she could climb the trees in a way that would not have been possible otherwise.

And for Fix, the Birdman, we created his wings in 3D and a digital double for the flying sequences.

Hybrid characters can be particularly complex because you have to make the real person and the digital elements feel like one character.

• You have worked on creatures in several very different films. What makes them so interesting to work on?

The creature is really a character in its own right. It is part of the story.

Depending on the creature, we define, together with the Director and the Producers, what can be shot on set and enhanced with special effects, and what will be worked on digitally.

Most of the time, it is a combination of the two. You have make-up, prosthetics, costumes and practical effects on one side, and digital visual effects on the other.

The challenge is to make everything work together so that the audience believes the creature is real.