AI in The Wizard of Oz at Sphere
Pushing creative boundaries
The Wizard of Oz at Sphere harnesses the power of AI, alongside traditional VFX, to bring The Wizard of Oz – a film made in 1939 – to life in an unparalleled way.
Sphere Studios partnered with Google Cloud, Magnopus, creatives and technologists around the world to make this classic film, originally shot for a 4:3 frame, fit Sphere’s 160,000 sq. ft., 16k x 16k resolution screen that wraps up over and around the audience to create a fully immersive visual environment.
Three main techniques were employed: super resolution – to increase the resolution of the original film for the highest resolution screen in the world; outpainting – to fill in characters where they were cut off in the original film, but because of the size of Sphere’s screen, can now be seen in their entirety; and performance generation – to “create” new performances from characters who we know were there in the scene, but were not seen due to camera pans and framing changes.
Thousands of researchers, programmers, engineers, visual effects artists, archivists and producers across the film and technology industries worked together to both fine-tune new AI models on the original film and troves of archival material; and expand and enhance the film using visual effects for this immersive medium – all while staying true to the original film and the filmmakers’ intent. The combination of artistry and advanced technologies used for The Wizard of Oz at Sphere is bringing the film to unparalleled scale and clarity in order to fully immerse audiences in the Land of Oz.
Through The Wizard of Oz at Sphere, Sphere is leading the way in applying AI and visual effects to bring new creative possibilities to the entertainment industry, and wonder to the world.