How Westworld Season 4 Created Christina's Game Look

Exclusive: Westworld VFX supervisor Jay Worth details the process of creating Christina’s game look in season 4, which wasn’t detailed on the page.

Westworld's visual effects supervisor, Jay Worth, is revealing how Christina's game look was created in season 4. Originating as a neo-Western science-fiction series based on Michael Crichton's 1973 film of the same name, Westworld followed a fictional amusement park inhabited by android "hosts," who slowly became cognizant of their programming. By the end of season 2, though, it evolved into a fully futuristic, dystopian setting, as the show expanded into the real world. The series debuted on HBO back in 2016 to impressive ratings and, despite the COVID-19 pandemic affecting Westworld season 4, it finally returned to television in June. It stars Evan Rachel Wood, Thandiwe Newton, Jeffrey Wright, Tessa Thompson, James Marsden, Aaron Paul, Ed Harris, and Anthony Hopkins.

Fans of Westworld were given their first glimpse at Christina in the season 4 trailer, and by the time she was introduced, it was clear she was entirely different from Evan Rachel Wood's Delores. The character works for Olympiad Entertainment, creating narratives for video games, though it quickly becomes evident that things around her are not what they seem. The games she designs actually serve as ways to control human behavior, and the company, as it turns out, is where Charlotte Hale's directives branch out of. Season 4's Christina plot has intrigued audiences, and, like much of the series, its budget and behind-the-scenes talent create spectacles that attract attention, with the character's game look serving as a prime example.

Now, in an exclusive interview with Screen Rant, Worth details how Christina's game look was made this season. He says there was no specific idea at first, just that she describes something that "has character to it." He then notes that CoSA VFX brought forward the concept of using a depth camera, which maps the body and creates a three-dimensional object. Read Worth's full explanation regarding the show's visual effects, and Christina's game look in particular, below:

Jay Worth: The big one was this game look that we had to create for Christina. That ended up being a very integral part of the season and the story. We ended up partnering with CoSA VFX. We were kind of pitching it out to different people, and we didn't necessarily have a concrete idea when we first wrote it. When they were first writing it, it was just she's describing something that's changing, and it has this character to it. CoSA's the one who brought this idea of using something called a depth camera. I don't know if you've ever used a Kinect or something for your video game console that maps your body, and sometimes people hack it, and it looks like this weird three-dimensional object. Those are called depth cameras. So, how we created all of this look for this game was, we ended up shooting with multiple depth cameras, so it creates what's called a point cloud for an individual. You then could take that point cloud, and it can be a three-dimensional object, but it has that odd distortion pattern that we liked.

Then, we were able to add things in like brush strokes, so it almost feels like a moving water color. A moving painting was kind of the inspiration for how to visualize this world. We were tying it back a little bit to how she had been a painter — all those things that feel like they're the same DNA as you build on it. Host city was another huge one. That was more of a conundrum from the beginning. When John Carlos found the viceroy location and started building all these images of the tower, then it was just on us to figure out how to incorporate it and how to deal with the height. We ended up shooting plates from helicopters for the looks out the window, and so many different aspects of things. Once we were able to figure out where it was, what it was, how it was incorporated, we were able to just collect all the pieces we needed to be able to build it out correctly in visual effect.

After season 3 of the hit series left audience members feeling underwhelmed, writer Alison Schapker promised improvements in season 4, understanding that many missed the theme park experience. So far, the reception towards Westworld's latest episodes remains largely positive, and with the inclusion of a new amusement park, as well as the concept behind Olympiad Entertainment, it appears the show is delivering on its ability to keep a viewer's attention. With a finale in sight, it also leaves the door open to a lot more mystery surrounding how all of its events might end.

There is no denying the appeal of Westworld's style and visual effects, and it is always interesting to hear about the processes that go into creating something on this level. Christina's game look is just one example of how much work VFX artists and other behind-the-scenes talent tackle. Fans of Westworld can look forward to the season 4 finale and even more spectacle to come in a potential season 5.