ILM Senior Vice President Details How Percy Jackson is Using The Volume

Percy Jackson began production this past June and has not looked back since. Author and executive producer Rick Riordan has shared that the series has “mostly” finished principal photography on two of the eight planned episodes for the freshman season, which puts it on schedule to wrap production by its expected January 2023 finish. Much of that is thanks to the show’s use of Industrial Light & Magic’s StageCraft (also known as the Volume), a massive virtual production visual effects screen that has been used by The Mandalorian, Thor: Love and Thunder, and The Batman. “Our new Volume stage is an even more cutting-edge version of that wraparound virtual environment, making it one of the most advanced production stages in the world,” Riordan said. “We are using it for things that have never been attempted before, creating settings so realistic that if we do it right, you should never be able to guess which scenes were done on location and which were done on the stage.”

ILM Senior Vice President and General Manager Janet Lewin offered more insight on how Percy Jackson is using its new Volume stage, noting that the series is making the most of the technology.

“For Percy Jackson, this has been an incredible partnership with 20th and the filmmaking team. They are using the Volume in a similar way to The Mandalorian,” Lewin told ComicBook.com. “It is a run-of-show project. It’s not just a couple of sequences. It’s not just a pick-up shoot or an installation. They are trying to leverage all of the bells and whistles that come with a fully tricked out extra large Volume.”

The Volume that Percy Jackson is using is one of five that ILM has around the world. Lewin continued by noting her team has both permanent StageCraft locations as well as custom installations for projects that are unable to shoot in any of the existing spots.

“We have five Volumes, so we also have a Volume in London. We have four of the Volumes are what we call extra large, one in Manhattan Beach, one in Vancouver, and one in London. They’re all very large,” Lewin said. “We have a smedium Volume on the Disney lot which is really for classic TV mostly and pick-up shoots. We also do custom installations for projects that can’t have access to our permanent Volumes. We do that for Midnight Sky and The Batman and other non-Disney and non-Lucasfilm projects.”

As one of the few projects that has had access to a Volume, and the first to use the Vancouver-based one, Riordan stressed that these things are a reflection of how much faith Disney has in Percy Jackson.

“I want to acknowledge the unwavering support of our executives at the studio and the streaming service,” Riordan said. “Their investment in this show is a sign of how important Percy Jackson is to them, and how committed they are to making the highest quality adaptation you fans deserve. This show is going to look spectacular, and set a new standard for other shows to follow.”

Percy Jackson is currently in production and is without a release date.