Disney Television Animation Launching ‘Big Hero 6’-Themed Shorts

Disney Television Animation is launching a trio of shorts based on its Oscar-winning Big Hero 6 and Emmy-nominated Big Hero 6 The Series. The Baymax Dreams shorts are slated to debut Sept. 15 on DisneyNOW and the Disney Channel YouTube account.

Running two to three minutes each, they are directed by Simon J. Smith (Bee Movie, Penguins of Madagascar and short Shrek 4D) and features the franchise’s robot, Baymax, dreaming of electric sheep, bedbugs and duplicates of itself.

The VFX and animation world is starting to explore the potential of real-time gaming engines to speed up content creation, and in the case of Baymax Dreams, Disney is working with Unity Technologies, making these shorts with that company’s real-time rendering technology traditionally used for games.

“Working in Unity is like having every department at your fingertips,” said Smith. “The results of Unity’s parallel, nonlinear workflow and real-time rendering meant we were able to make Baymax Dreams in half the time — allowing us to spend the other half on experimentation and the creative process.”

JR Grant, senior vp production and technology, direct to consumer and international for The Walt Disney Co., added that Unity could also help the company to produce content across multiple platforms.

Unity will present its Baymax Dreams work with Disney Television Animation in several presentations next week at CG confab SIGGRAPH. It also posted a video introduction here.

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