By Iain Blair

It’s been five years since Spider-Man swung his way around New York fighting crime and saving the world. Now he’s back in Marvel Studios’ Spider-Man: Brand New Day. It’s an apt title because, while it again stars Tom Holland in his fourth outing as the superhero, Peter Parker is a changed man. He’s dealing with loss, regret and fractured relationships with the love of his life, MJ (Zendaya), and best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon).

The changes extend behind the camera as well. Director Destin Daniel Cretton has taken over the reins of the franchise, assembling a creative team that included DP Brett Pawlak, production designer Charles Wood and VFX supervisor Jerome Chen. The editors were Nat Sanders, ACE; Gina Sansom; and Harry Yoon, ACE.

We spoke with the director (Wonder Man, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) about making the film, his workflow, editing and dealing with all the VFX.

What were the main technical challenges?
From the beginning, we wanted a specific aesthetic and locations that felt as real as the actual streets of New York because, to me, the city is the engine that fuels Spider-Man. One of the key logistical challenges was recreating New York sincewe mainly shot in the UK, and most of the location work was actually done in Glasgow because its period architecture and grid-based street layout are very close to those of New York.

Early in preproduction, almost a year before filming even began, we were walking through the streets of New York with production designer Charlie Wood, VFX supervisor Jerome Chen, stunt coordinator Peng Zhang and DP Brett Pawlak to really get a feel for the Glasgow and soak it all in.

The biggest challenge was coordinating everyone from the beginning so that everything was shot according to plan and the lighting remained seamless between the location footage and the extensions and VFX added in post. Because time was short, I was lucky to have a team that clicked from the start and created a plan that kept everything seamless throughout.

Tell us about integrating all the post and visual effects from day one.
The strategy was to capture as much in-camera as possible. As you know, in most cases the third act of movies like this has the heaviest VFX lift. You save that for last, and it’s the biggest thing that you’re crunching in terms of data and finals. The third act in this movie was very stunt-heavy and captured primarily in-camera, although of course there are still lots of paint-outs and extensions. Audiences will see in our third act that one sequence required some very magical work by our VFX artists. But what everybody was working from was real, tangible captured material of stunt performers doing some incredible choreography. That was the base that our VFX artists were able to use to inspire all the other art that they were creating.

The flying sequences were amazing. Did you and Brett develop new ways of shooting them, as they look even more impressive than in previous films?
Yes, Brett worked very closely with Jerome and his team to find new ways for Spider-Man to swing through the city of New York. We looked at reference footage of wing-suiters and online parkour videos to find the angles that would give you a sense of vertigo and make you feel like you’re right there with him as he walks along a building’s edge or jumps off and reaches terminal velocity. Once we captured these moments with our cameras, our VFX team meticulously worked out the real physics of each sequence, calculating Spider-Man’s weight, terminal velocity, web length and the pendulum swing based on his speed. All of that created a pretty spectacular experience. Seeing it on the big screen in both 3D and 2D, I was blown away.

What about previz?
We did quite a bit of previz with SonyTorchlight, Digital Domain and Framestore Preproduction Services before we started; previz has really come a long way. Some of the early previz sequences that we got from our VFX houses were already so good that we were like, “Damn, this looks amazing.”

What was the most difficult scene to shoot and why?
Every scene created its own challenges, but the big Hulk fight sequence was particularly difficult due to the setting and the terrain, which was a wet-down, slippery, demolished office building that was supposed to be a hundred stories up in our movie. That terrain was quite challenging to shoot in.

And then when mapping out this fight, there were a lot of VFX because the Hulk was involved. We had a lot of computing to do beforehand, as we had to know exactly where our shots were going to be. That was a sequence that really required all hands on deck. The reps from our VFX houses were there every day to make sure that everything we were shooting was going to be right for the post pipeline.

Break down the post pipeline for us. What was involved on a day-to-day basis?
When we got into post, we were all in one office at Marvel. We had an amazing editing team — Nat Sanders, Harry Yoon and Gina Sansom, all three of whom I had worked with before; they were all busy cutting every day. Right next to that team were our VFX editors and our whole VFX team. And then, within a hallway’s walk of each other, was our screening room, where our VFX were constantly coming in. Everybody was working in tandem because of our post schedule, which was quite short for a big movie like this; everything had to run very smoothly and be happening at the same time.

What were the main editing challenges?
These kinds of movies are always challenging. The thing that was not a challenge on this movie was the performances, as the actors were so good. It was more about choosing between three amazing performances, and then you’re just looking at slight variations. But the primary challenge on this film was getting the time to lock the cut early enough so that our VFX artists had time to really hone the look and the details. Thank goodness we had three editors, which meant we were able to get our cut in order early enough to ensure the VFX shots had time to bake.

Tell us about collaborating with Jerome Chen.
I love Jerome. He jumped in from the get-go, and really understands the importance of collaborating with the other department heads. Sometimes department heads can feel like they’re competing with each other, but Jerome understands the importance of everyone telling the same story and working toward the same goal. He worked closely with Charlie Wood to make sure that Charlie’s designs were in sync with what his VFX plans were — everything from set extensions to the feel of New York City to the way the Hulk would interact with Charlie Wood’s set.

The same is true with our DP, Brett Pawlak. He and Jerome got very close and would talk in depth about shots and lighting to make sure that everything we were doing on the VFX side matched the aesthetic that Brett was doing with the rest of the movie.

How many visual effects shots are there in total?
We had 1,847 shots in the end, and we used quite a lot of different vendors, including Sony Pictures Imageworks, Framestore, ILM, Cantina Creative, Soho VFX, SDFX Studios, Rise and Instinctual.

What was the most difficult visual effects sequence to get right?
The Hulk was the biggest challenge, and ILM did all those scenes where he fights Spider-Man. To many, the most iconic pairing in the comics is Spider-Man and the Hulk. So when we brought back Mark Ruffalo as the Hulk, we gave careful consideration to how we’d put those two icons together and what – or who – would cause Bruce Banner to become savage again. The artists who worked on the Hulk are pretty incredible. You’ll see the Hulk like you’ve never seen him before. The close-ups on this character are so detailed that you can see right into the pores of his nose. It’s pretty amazing. I haven’t seen anything like it.

Then there were all the scenes with Spider-Man flying and swinging that you mentioned. It required so much detailed work to create the New York cityscapes. If you look closely into every window that Spider-Man passes as he’s diving down a skyscraper, you’ll see a detailed interior, even if just for a frame. It’s pretty incredible what they pulled off. Sony Pictures Imageworks did all the VFX for the flying sequences.

Tell us about the importance of sound and sound design to you and for this film?
We recorded the sound mix at Sony with sound mixers Onnalee Blank and Greg Russell. I’ve worked with Onnalee since my first feature. Luke Gibleon and Chuck Michael were our sound designers, and Jack Whittaker was our supervising sound editor and sound designer. Our whole sound team was just incredible.

I think sound is as important as anything else in a movie. The movie doesn’t really come to life until you have a good sound mix. This movie, in particular, had several places where sound actually led the picture, and where there were very specific sounds that we wanted to capture.

One example is in all the swinging scenes with Spider-Man and his web. I always wanted to hear what it would sound like when that web gets pulled tight and he’s flying through the air at a couple of hundred miles per hour. What does it sound like when it’s vibrating at that speed? That sound we found actually influenced the shot we designed, so that the shot matched the sound we were chasing. And in many cases, the sound design not only enhances the picture but leads or influences it in a different way.

What was involved in the DI? You must’ve worked hard on all that detail, right?
We did the DI with Tom Poole at Company 3, and we did work hard on it. Tom was with us from before we started shooting, and he and Brett got together and created a great LUT for us to use throughout the shoot. They based a lot of it around all the tests that we shot with the suit. They came up with a LUT that gives a very cinematic feel, but which also makes sure that those reds and blues pop and always feel like true deep reds and blues, not a little orange or a little pink. It was a complicated LUT to create, but once they had everything balanced, it really looked beautiful.

Having Tom as the colorist at the end of the whole project was perfect, as he was just a real joy to work with. He does a lot of these big movies, but he knows that we don’t need to follow a rule book on what came before us. He and Brett created a beautiful look for this movie that I think allows it to stand on its own and feel really special. I’m so happy with the way it turned out.

Industry insider Iain Blair has been interviewing the biggest directors in Hollywood and around the world for years. He is a regular contributor to Variety and has written for such outlets as Reuters, the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times and the Boston Globe.