Planning to catch Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes in cinemas this weekend? Don’t forget to pay close attention to how realistic the ape characters are.
Indonesian animator Sashya Subono Halse literally had a hand in that – as well as plenty of other movies and TV shows you’re probably very familiar with.
The 36-year-old Subono is an animator at Weta FX, a digital visual effects and animation company based in Wellington, New Zealand.
In her four years with Weta FX, she has worked her animation magic on the Marvel Cinematic Universe television series Hawkeye and She-Hulk: Attorney At Law, and Disney movies Avatar: The Way Of Water and Kingdom of the Planet Of The Apes.
Her expertise includes matchmoving, which involves making computer-generated elements appear as if they were recorded in the real world, and facial motion animation, which brings a character’s face to life by recording the movements and expressions of a human face and transferring them to a digital character.
Subono told CNA Women that for as long as she can remember, she has been passionate about film and animation. She shares an affinity for entertainment with her relatives: Her uncle Adrie Subono is a well-known concert promoter in Indonesia and her cousins Melanie Subono and Adrian Subono are both musicians and actors in the country.
“I’m an Indonesian who grew up in Wellington, and when I was young, I was exposed to lots of movies like The Lord Of The Rings trilogy and Pixar’s Toy Story – I was obsessed with Buzz Lightyear and his design,” she said.
“When I saw these movies, I thought to myself, ‘Wow, that looks amazing – I want to be a part of that.’”
That interest led her and her New Zealander husband to move to Indonesia in 2010 after their wedding, where Subono had enrolled in a diploma in film.
