From fear-born creature work to seamless environmental and combat enhancements, Vine FX elevates the dark fantasy of Netflix’s The Witcher Season 4
Led by Ole-Aleksander Nordby, Compositing Supervisor and Creative Lead/CG Supervisor Tim Kilgour
and VFX Supervisor, Simon Carr, the Vine FX team return to ‘The Continent’ with a multi-episode VFX
delivery spanning creature development, close-up FX, environment extensions, combat enhancements,
and established magical effects. The team worked on 7 episodes of the season, and delivered nearly 70
VFX shots across 18 sequences, combining technical innovation with seamless integration to support
some of the show’s most intense and memorable sequences, while maintaining narrative continuity and
franchise lore.
The Tentacle Creature
One of the most technically demanding sequences delivered by Vine FX for The Witcher Season 4
centred on a tentacle-like creature emerging from a character’s psychological fear. Building the creature
entirely around a pre-shot performance, the team handled the full asset lifecycle – concept development,
mood boards, sculpting, animation, Houdini-driven muscle and skin simulations, lighting, and final
macro-scale compositing.
“We were given the sequence and a few early concepts, but it needed full development. It
became a collection of ideas from both sides, mixing the Netflix show team’s references with our own.
We had tentacles from octopus and jellyfish motion to tree roots, ink drips and even some early AI
imagery.” Rapid alignment between client and studio allowed the asset to lock early, “There were a
couple of iterations on colour, but the show team approved the first looks almost immediately. From
there it just started to breathe and take on life.”Tim Kilgour, Creative Lead/CG Supervisor.
As the creature’s look became clearer, the team pushed its personality and aggression. The refinement
stage focused on behavioural nuance, particularly how the creature interacted with the actress in
extreme close-up.
Because the camera was positioned at macro distance, subtle physical cues had to be reproduced with
high accuracy.
“You’re watching it with a macro lens, so you can’t hide anything. We needed to find a way to make the interaction look real on the actress’s face. “We had to track tiny indents in her cheek to generate
accurate shadow passes and maintain contact fidelity.” To support the creature’s organic motion, Vine
FX expanded its internal pipeline, introducing new Houdini-based muscle, skin sliding and deformation
systems It was the first time we’d developed this part of our pipeline, and it gave us the realism we
needed.”Simon Carr, VFX Supervisor
Despite the technical complexity, the creature work was delivered with remarkable efficiency by an
exceptionally small team.
“One animator, one artist on effects, and one on lighting. It was incredible to see how such a small group could deliver something so complex. A very small team of talented people doing exactly what they do best.”
Tim Kilgour
Invisible Worldbuilding in The Continent
Alongside the creature work, Vine FX delivered extensive invisible VFX enhancements across the season’s environments, including city extensions, sky replacements, mountain builds, clean-up work, and Digital Matte Painting shots. One of the largest undertakings was a full chase sequence reconstructed from Lidar and practical plates into a fully integrated CG environment.
Achieving believability in these varied environments demanded precise attention to lighting,
depth-of-field and spatial logic.
“In some sequences it was super dark, so even the smallest thing had to be lit right. The comping had to be extremely precise for it to read properly or the shot would feel off. Placing everything exactly in 3D
space, knowing what should fall in or out of focus was another challenge, but the team did a great job
with this. It needed to follow the logic of the environment throughout each sequence, that’s what makes it feel real.”Ole-Aleksander Nordby, Visual Effects Supervisor
Combat Enhancements & Maintaining the Magic
The season’s combat sequences required extensive digital augmentation, including CG sword
replacements, digital arrows, blood and wound simulation – including moments of blood/black ooze
spurting from a character’s eyes – and retimed reactions to maintain stunt continuity.
“Typical of the series, there was a lot of fighting and stabbing happening. So we added CG swords, CG wounds and blood coming out of almost everywhere. It was a big mix of combat work and it gets quite gory but it’s fun to work on.”
Ole-Aleksander Nordby
Some shots required full digital reconstruction. One of the most complex involved a warped practical
sword.
“We had to replace the jacket, rebuild the arm and the leather jacket with all the straps and buckles that one of the characters was wearing. That’s all CG but it’s blended seamlessly. Sometimes the prop swords in the plates just didn’t behave the way swords should, bending or in unrealistic positions, so we also had to fix anything that wasn’t physically possible.”
Simon Carr
Alongside combat, Vine FX continued the franchise’s signature magic effects, force-like energy bursts
that interact with characters and environments. Maintaining visual continuity with previous seasons
was essential.
“The magic in the series has rules… it’s not just a random effect. It always needs that punch, that physical push, otherwise it’s not The Witcher.”
Ole-Aleksander Nordby
Watch Vine FX’s VFX breakdown here:
All eight episodes of The Witcher Season 4 are streaming now on Netflix.
