The Art and Soul of Blade Runner 2049

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The Memory Orb is my favourite piece of kit in the movie. This piece of wizardry is used to design memories for Wallace’s replicants, to help create structure for their personalities. These memories are created by a singular genius artist – Dr. Ana Stelline, a kind of virtual 3D artist using the Memory Orb to manipulate holographic stories which are then coded into replicants to make them feel more ‘real’ or human. “There’s a little of every artist in their work” she says. Dr. Ana Stelline creates memories for replicants using the Memory Orb Even if Wallace had acquired the information he needed to make his Nexus-9s reproduce, what was his endgame? Well, that’s quite confusing and I might even call it a bit of a plot hole. Wallace, who by 2049 has saved the world from famine and aided the off-world campaign to colonize more planets by producing his new brand of obedient Replicants, thinks humanity will need way more skinjobs if it plans to spread out across the galaxy. More Replicants than Wallace can possibly make, which is why he wants to create a new type of model that can reproduce on its own. A fittingly beautiful book that lives up to its somewhat presumptuous title. Having collected a number of "Art of" books, this is easily one of the best that I've actually read. In addition to providing loads of concept art, set photos, and stills from the finished product; this book also features a load of cast and crew interviews that cover a fair bit of what went into the making of the movie without overloading the reader. Lapointe does a good job of highlighting different parts of the movie's production as needed and also in reiterating key design philosophies behind the movie - the consistent reminders of the noir influence, the authenticity, the "soviet brutalism" style, etc - that went into the making of the film.

Blade Runner 2049 Poster Art - Etsy UK Blade Runner 2049 Poster Art - Etsy UK

This is the first of two Blade Runner 2049 art books, the newer one being "Interlinked - The Art" (which I have also recently reviewed). Comparing the two books, this one has much more information about the whole process of making the movie, which was very interesting and gave me a lot of insight that I look forward to considering the next time I watch the film. The art was also beautiful, though including many photographs from production, and being much more focused on detailing the process of making the film. "Interlinked," on the other hand is almost all concept art. In 1982’s ground-breaking science-fiction film Blade Runner, the world saw a vision of the future so bold and breath-taking it remains at the forefront of pop culture. Thirty-five years later, many of the world-renowned original cast and crew made a thrilling return to that world. Their journey is chronicled with captivating detail in this official visual guide to Blade Runner 2049, presented in an oversized and luxe full-colour format. Of course, Wallace’s plan is in line with Freysa’s freedom fighters in a way. After all, if Replicants were to begin reproducing, wouldn’t humanity’s opinion on the machines change? The only thing really separating Replicant from man at this point is the ability to create life, the wall between the species that has allowed the masters to continue treating the slaves as less than human. If Wallace were to succeed, wouldn’t this new status quo cause some sort of ethical paradox, at which point humanity would stop seeing Replicants as property? As Lt. Joshi says to K, the truth about Rachael’s child would “break the world.” It would also destroy Wallace’s business empire. Surely, it would be impossible for Wallace to continue selling Replicants as slaves if consumers viewed the machines as “more human than human.” Wallace himself makes the best case against his own mission when he says that mankind lost the stomach for human slaves when the Replicants arrived. Anyway when I head that there was a long (very long) awaited sequel coming out I had to know more. Now like it or loath it - or generally not really bothered by it the sequel Blade Runner 2049 has some amazing visuals. The author documented the film’s production for two years, with unprecedented access to the creative process that brought this epic film to life. Exclusive concept art, storyboards, behind-the-scenes photography, and production stills are accompanied by fascinating insights and interviews by the cast and crew.

This is Luv (Sylvia Hoeks). She works for the head of the Wallace Corporation, Niander Wallace and she is ruthless. She is his soldier, his warrior. Wallace played by Jared Leto (interestingly, David Bowie had been earmarked for the role) is the zen-like inventor who has taken over and well-surpassed the technology developed by Tyrell in the creation of replicants. Now he is the most powerful man on the planet. I was delighted to give a talk at a recent screening of Blade Runner 2049 hosted at the stunning The Conran Shop showroom in London’s Fulham Road in collaboration with Sony. I took this opportunity to dissect and discuss my favourite artefacts in the film. Here I share my opinions on the hidden narrative behind these objects, supplemented by fascinating facts gleaned from conversations with the movie’s Set Decorator Alessandra Querzola SDSA and Concept Artist Mike Hill. Given the technological, political and environmental news that has hit us over the last few months, the choice and design of many of these objects predict the future with more insight than one might realise. Blade Runner (1982) The memory orb movie prop was made as a fully functional physical object. 2049 Property Master Doug Harloker explains in the You Tube video Adam Savage Explores the Props of Blade Runner 2049! how the memory orb is made up of concentric rings which move by pressing different buttons. These rings move at different speeds and the speed is controlled by a button on one end. It’s structurally reminiscent of a series of camera lenses joined together. A curated collection of some of the most powerful and awe-inspiring Brutalist architecture ever built.

Blade Runner 2049 Posters for Sale | Redbubble Blade Runner 2049 Posters for Sale | Redbubble

I love the memory orb not only as a design object but also conceptually as an artefact that makes us consider what it means to be human and because of the questions it throws up around the connection between memory and identity. Gassner created what he refers to as a “pattern language” – a core vision which informed the production design, the sets and the choice of many of the objects and artefacts throughout the movie. This began with the redesign of the iconic flying police car – K’s Spinner, which is particularly angular and robust. The posters for Mother! and The Shape of Water started out as pencil sketches, while the Blade Runner 2049 poster was made entirely digitally, using an iPad Pro’s Apple Pencil and the Procreate app. (Jean also used pencil sketches, promotional material, director Denis Villeneuve's prior films, and time-lapse photos for reference points.) His two character posters for Mother! were both hand-painted. “I’m really happy with how I used different media to achieve different moods and feelings,” Jean said during a phone interview earlier this week. Now that aside - and what really created its lasting impression on me was the images, this book for its size (and its big) has fewer words than you would expect and that is partly down I think to the intention of letting the pictures do the talking. And boy do they shout loud and clear.

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So what the hell is this dude doing? Whether a plot hole or simply evidence of Wallace’s madness, this particular bit of motivation remains a mystery.

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The Blade Runner 2049 journey is chronicled with captivating detail in this official visual guide presented in an oversized, luxe, full-colour format. The author documented the film’s production for two years, gaining unprecedented access to the creative process of bringing this epic to life. Shop Now

This book is for the fan- the images are crisp clear and huge! Its as if you have the film on pause and I think who ever put this book together it was a labour of love. The F582 or ‘Ribbon Chair’ was designed in the 1960s by Pierre Paulin for Artifort. Paulin’s designs are distinctive in their striking sculptural shapes and earned him many prizes worldwide. The Blade Runner Wiki t ells us “ Dr. Ana Stelline is a subcontractor under the Wallace Corporation working as a memory designer at an ‘upgrade center’ named ‘Stelline Laboratories’. Although enamored with her work, Stelline is confined within an isolated dome, only visible through a visitor window; due to a ‘compromised immune system’, meaning that if she were to leave, she would die and the sole reason she is not off-world. Her parents had put her there, but gave her enough to make her happy”. The Memory Orb in Blade Runner 2049

Blade Runner 2049 - Rotten Tomatoes Blade Runner 2049 - Rotten Tomatoes

I adore the 300-story Wallace Corporation’s interiors and vast architectural spaces. These palatial, cathedral-like rooms were influenced by an ancient temple in Kyoto, Japan. We find wooden floors and walls and a large pond of water in the middle. In Blade Runner 2049 natural resources such as these as so rare that they signify real luxury and wealth. The Wallace Corporation building in Blade Runner 2049 These gorgeous, hand blown, heavy weight, double old fashioned glasses have been made by same Italian glass company in Tuscany since 1974 and are available to buy in our store.It's also huge, like massively huge. Almost too physically large to be easily read, but this wide format is a great way to present the artwork from the movie. So Ana has spent the last few years of her life in a single room inside a Replicant upgrade center, creating fake memories for Wallace, who implants them into his Nexus-9s. This is why K has the memory of the wooden horse. It’s in fact Ana’s memory from when she was a little girl and left behind in a San Diego scrap yard. As Ana explains to K during his initial investigation into whether he’s Rachael’s son, every designer of memories puts a little bit of him or herself in the memory. The production and art department teams found plenty of Brutalist inspiration when scouting the angular, concrete buildings in Budapest where the movie was shot but there has been some debate on the use of this word as a visual style or as reference to Brutalism, the architectural movement born in the 1950s. Brutalist architecture has its roots in socialism and is so much more than a look or style – which is actually at odds with the film’s take on a future born from capitalism, as pointed out in an interesting article on Failed Architecture. K and his Spinner in Blade Runner 2049