VES Nomination for ‘The Gorge’
News
Image Engine earns a 2026 VES Award nomination for Outstanding Environment in a Photoreal Feature for the Bodyweb environment in The Gorge.
Image Engine is proud to share that The Gorge has been nominated for a 2026 VES Award for ‘Outstanding Environment in a Photoreal Feature’. The nomination recognizes the Bodyweb environment we created — a fully CG, large-scale environment overtaken by a vast, organic network of vine-like tendrils that feels disturbingly alive.
OUTSTANDING ENVIRONMENT IN A PHOTOREAL FEATURE
The Gorge; The Bodyweb
- Daniel James Cox
- Yosuke Inomata
- Clint Rea
- Gabriel Pires
Congratulations to everyone involved in bringing this film to life, and to the VES judges for recognizing the artistry and technical achievement behind this work.
Image Engine’s visual effects on The Gorge were led by our visual effects supervisor Christian Irles and visual effects producer Katie Johnson.
BREAKDOWN REEL
Take a look inside the Gorge, where we built a fully CG industrial facility with machinery, railway tracks, nuclear missiles, metal walkways, and the procedurally generated bodyweb that wraps around every surface.
To bring the bodyweb to life, hero bodies were hand-animated to convey faint movement and breathing, while surrounding vines were procedurally simulated to move in unison. Achieving its semi-translucent look required the creation of detailed internal geometry to block and scatter light correctly, and external geometry consisting of thorns, vines and branches to add complexity and depth. The final look required constant back and forth between modeling, lookdev, lighting, and compositing.
The result is a photoreal environment that feels disturbingly alive and threatening.
Explore more
Learn more about Image Engine’s visual effects work.
About VES
The Visual Effects Society (VES), the VFX industry’s professional global honorary society, announced the nominees for its 24th Annual VES Awards, encompassing 25 categories across film, television, special venue projects, technological innovation, student projects, and more. Recognized as the craft’s marquee awards celebration, the VES Awards will be held on February 25, 2026 at The Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles.
Nominees were selected by VES members worldwide over the weekend during their Global Nomination Event, which hosted 46 in-person and 14 virtual judging panels across Asia, Europe, India, Oceania, and three in North America.
For the full list of nominations, visit the VES website.
About Image Engine
Image Engine is a world-class visual effects studio for feature films and television located in Vancouver, BC. Since 1995, our studio has captivated audiences with stunning photoreal visual effects of fantastical creatures and epic environments.
Well-known for our groundbreaking alien animations in Neill Blomkamp’s critically-acclaimed film District 9, we have gone on to produce more award-winning work in The Book of Boba Fett, The Mandalorian, Game Of Thrones, Lost in Space, Jurassic World, Elysium, and more. Most recently, Image Engine contributed to Obi-Wan Kenobi, Moon Knight, Snowpiercer, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, and Venom: Let There Be Carnage.
