As experienced players on Bosch, Moving Target understood what was required on season four and could tackle shots quickly. For example, one shot involved a drone pull-out that begins on Harry Bosch at an L.A. location and reveals a landscape of palm trees, a sidewalk and the busy street below.

The effects challenge here was to remove unwanted crew members and production trucks, and take out some cars while keeping others in the shot. To do that, Moving Target crafted eight matte paintings that changed over the course of the shot to replace the road and sidewalk.

Compositor Jeremy Nelson used Blackmagic Design’s Fusion 9 Studio to key the existing treetops back over the top of the matte paintings. “Fusion Studio’s ability to animate the color range of the specific color to be keyed out was a big help,” he says. “As the shot pulls out, the color of the tree leaves change very slightly due to lighting changes. Also, the leaves themselves are different shades of green, red and yellow. Being able animate the range of colors over the length of a shot really saves a lot of hassle.”

Another scene in season four with a different kind of effects requirement saw Moving Target need to enhance a prosthetic hand. The on-set hand was deemed too decayed, so again in Fusion, Nelson augmented the live-action photography, this time combining projection and grid-warping tools for the final shot.

A prosthetic hand shot for a scene in Bosch featured a thumb that was considered too decayed.

A matte painting of a ‘new’ thumb was made to track into the shot.

A wire-frame of the thumb area allowed the matte-painted thumb to be projected onto the prosthetic one.

The final composite.