The future of the fan-made film, Spider-Man: Lotus, has been up-in-the-air for a while now. After a ton of controversy surrounding its star and director, many were left wondering if it would ever see the light of day. Now, the entire VFX team has quit the project, leaving behind a video of what could have been and providing more evidence that Lotus won't be released any time soon.
Max Aurnhammer, one of the digital artists who worked on the film, posted a video on YouTube showing off the work that he and the rest of the VFX team did for the project. In the video, Aurhammer is joined by modellers Nero Omar and Justice Smith, alongside animators Hunter Adams and Aadith Iyer, to explain how they tackled the web-slinging project, revealing previously unseen footage from the film.
Most notably, the video shows off some completed action sequences of Spider-Man swinging through New York, with scenes that are reminiscent of other "final swing" moments from Spider-Man films. The team shares how these were produced, even admitting that one of them was re-animated seven times from scratch to get it exactly right. Meanwhile, Aurnhammer walks through how he created the digital sets using actual photos from New York City.
The controversy surrounding Spider-Man Lotus has been prevalent for some time now. As the highly anticipated fan film was in the middle of production, several leaks emerged showing that the film’s star and director had a history of using racist and ableist language. Both have issued apologies, but for many, this wasn't good enough, and the project has been a sinking ship ever since. In fact, the director has gone radio silent on all social media, leading many to believe the film has been scrapped altogether. Multiple actors and an editor have also distanced themselves from the project because of the behaviour of the lead and the director.
This controversy has now led the VFX team to the decision to walk away from the project. And while they deny claims that they were made to crunch during the film's production, and say they were actually well treated by management, they do disavow the director's actions. They say that their decision to quit the project was solely based on racism and ableism in the leaked DMs.
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