Tarsem described it as a cross between an atomic bomb blast and a macrophotography slow motion droplet that generates a Tsunami in the Oil (contaminated ocean). He had a clear idea of what he wanted, but also gave us a lot of leway to design the simulations, the look and even what the shots would be, from composition to introducing additional shots to tell the story.

► Art of VFX : Immortals interview

Clint's approach to visual effects is realism and a tool to tell the story of the film. Clint's shooting style doesn't change just because there are visual effects in the movie. The visual effects team must have a very robust plan of how to achieve the desired effect without overstating our presence while on set.

► The Art of VFX

Watching the VFX breakdown is almost more beautiful than the completed scene itself, and far more impressive than the actual film as a whole. Scanline VFX, known for their work with fluid effects...

► Movieline

Scanline VFX utilized its proprietary simulation software, called "Flowline," to create natural phenomena, such as the spectacular tsunami recreation in "Hereafter."

► Marketwire.com

After raising the bar for the wild fluid sim ride on 2012, Scanline VFX had to shift gears for the more real world demands of Clint Eastwood's Hereafter. Stephan Trojansky tells us what new challenges this entailed.

► Animation World Network

"To create the requisite tidal wave, resulting water effects and ensuing destruction, overall visual effects supervisor Michael Owens chose Scanline based on the studio's successful water simulations in previous films."

► FXGuide

"Michael Owens, who is Eastwood's long-time visual effects supervisor, collaborated with ScanlineVFX/Los Angeles on the tour de force tsunami sequence at the beginning, and visions of the hereafter scattered throughout. The challenges were obviously different both technically and stylistically."

► Animation World Network

"One of the most challenging assignments in visual effects is simulating photoreal CG water on a large scale. It was only two years ago that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences bestowed Scientific and Technical Achievement Awards to the software brainiacs behind water simulation, and the best-known uses of this technology have been in fantastical films such as 2012, Poseidon, and Pirates of the Caribbean (read more about the water simulation technology). So it was notable to see water simulation playing a pivotal part in Warner Bros.' Hereafter by Clint Eastwood, a director hardly known for cutting-edge fantasy effects. Yet when Eastwood read Peter Morgan's script for Hereafter, he knew he would need to simulate a terrifying tsunami in order to propel this tale."

► Millimeter magazine

"This small excursion takes a nightmarish turn when, in a formidable piece of special effects work orchestrated by visual effects supervisor Michael Owens, effects house Scanline and editors Joel Cox and Gary Roach. Marie gets caught in a monstrous tsunami.

Eastwood's team makes this wall of water and Marie's near-death experience in it so convincing that it can't help but be deeply disturbing to watch, giving us more of a sense of what being trapped in a tsunami would actually be like than we may want. So it's easy to believe that once Marie returns to Paris, she finds herself disturbed by what happened and her glimpse of the beyond."

► Los Angeles Times "Hereafter" review

"Clint Eastwood's Hereafter opens with the most exciting, expertly assembled flood scene in movie history. A tsunami gathers force as a giant wave courses toward an Asian beach resort, swatting a large ship as if it were a toy boat, then crashes on shore and pours through the town. Special-effects experts know that water is among the hardest computer-generated elements to render accurately, but this tsunami's power is utterly plausible."

► Time Magazine

"This is his sixth film in less than four years, the production spanned four countries and it represents Eastwood's biggest foray into digital visual effects....

The movie also has a big, harrowing special-effects scene early on and reserves its third act for something far less bombastic. That resists the usual physics of Hollywood moviemaking, and executive producer Steven Spielberg talked to Morgan about that decision early on as potential concern. The screenwriter, interviewed this week by phone in London, said he wrote a different ending that would have a grander scale. Everyone agreed, though, that in the final analysis, "Hereafter" was going to keep its unconventional contours."

► Los Angeles Times

AWN: Hereafter 2010

..."Scanline VFX collaborated closely with Eastwood and Michael Owens, the overall vfx supervisor. Led by co-VFX Supervisors Stephan Trojansky and Bryan Grill, CG Supervisor Danielle Plantec and Compositing Supervisor Joe Farrell, Scanline provided 169 shots. Given Scanline's expertise with water simulation, it's not surprising that the key sequence was the recreation of the tsunami, which drew upon a wide array of techniques: full CG water shots and CG water extensions to water plates, digital doubles, CG set extensions, matte paintings, digital make-up fx and full CG environments with extensive destruction, from toppling digital palm trees to colliding digital cars. Also central to the film is the "hereafter" effect' sprinkled throughout, which, gives the viewer glimpses into the afterlife. The water evidently raises the bar for Scanline after the stunning work in 2012. And drawing from Close Encounters of the Third Kind to Ghost, Owens, Compositing Supervisor Joe Farrell and Editor Mitch Glaser created progressions from consciousness, to near-death, then back again."

► Animation World Network

Vizworld.com

..."One of the many natural disaster you get to see in the upcoming 2012 is Tidal Waves caused by undersea earthquakes. In a new video on Yahoo, Roland Emmerich and his visual effects team talks about the difficulties in modeling and animating water on that scale. The work was done by Scanline..."

► Vizworld.com

AWN: 2012

..."Engel says that Scanline was able to deliver a completely new photoreal version of each shot within a couple of days. "That was something they promised in the beginning and actually delivered. So for Roland, it was a great experience in regard to this interactivity. He didn't have to totally guess what it might look like in the end and had something to look at that had white water and just looked great."

► Animation World Network

Computer Graphics World

..."Scanline floated those giant arks on waves that surged over mountains and, in another sequence, sent water rushing through Washington, DC. “Usually when you do effects, you have a range of shots,” says Stephan Trojansky, visual effects supervisor. “We had huge tidal wave shots in dimensions no one had ever seen before, and hundreds of miles of floodwaters. It was really tough.”

► Computer Graphics World

Forbes: Scanline work on 2012

..."Scanline VFX artists created over 100 complex water simulation shots, including an aircraft carrier on a tidal wave crashing into the White House. Scanline VFX's toolbox included 3ds Max, the VRay plug-in and a proprietary simulation system, Flowline. "Over 95 percent of our shots were fully CG, and creating them required 1,200 terabytes of disk space. The advantage of 3ds Max is that it can handle enormous data sets and you can just do a lot of the work right out of the box," said Stephan Trojansky, Scanline VFX senior visual effects supervisor."

► Forbes

Animation World Network

..."Stephan Trojansky, President and VFX Supervisor at Scanline VFX/Los Angeles, said, "Bryan brings a wealth of visual effects experience to Scanline, particularly in compositing and 2D digital imaging. He is a great complement to what we do here, and he will be a key player in furthering our Hollywood presence and cultivating new relationships with studios, producers, and industry talent."

► Animation World Network

CG TALK: 300 Art Director Grant Freckleton

"... the boat FX? Full credit to Scanline in Germany. Those guys are CG fluid genuises. The bulk of the time of those shots were spent tweaking the comping end of things, because their CG water looked pretty much perfect from very early on. Again, refer to Cinefex for more in depth technical details."

"The Electronic Theater also presents a watershed year for fluid simulation in feature films. Scanlines 300´s Liquid Battlefield, Sony Pictures Animation´s Surf´s Up, and Digital Domain and Industrial Light and Magic´s Pirates of the Caribbean all feature uniquely executed but beautifully believable digital oceans and waves", added Debevec.

► Siggraph Electronic Theater page
► Animation World Network covers Siggraph 2007 Electronic Theater

What Visual Effects Supervisor, Chris Watts has to say "We teamed up with Scanline of Germany, which did some water work on Poseidon. They got it. We showed them the frame from the book and if you compare the frame from the book to the frame from the movie, it´s just amazing how they did it. Not only did they make completely convincing water and ships, but they also went through the trouble to make all this secondary animation of Persians falling off masts and smashing on rocks.

► VFX World's Miller Time

Scanline's "Flow" in Siggraph 2006 Electronic Theater

► Siggraph 2006 Electronic Theater

J. Paul Peszko dives into the extraordinary advances in CG water on display this summer in "Poseidon" and "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man´s Chest".

► *Water, Water, Everywhere ...*

Studio Daily's Barbara Robertson covers Water Effects for Poseidon

► Poseidon´s Wet VFX Work

VFX World interviews Stanford professor Ron Fedkiw and Scanline Production's Stephan Trojansky about their advances in fluid dynamics.

► Fluid Dynamics: A Look at Two Giants