Dexter Studios contributed its technical expertise to the film ‘Colony’, which has been breaking box office records for the fastest-grossing film of the year, thereby maximizing the immersive experience of the zombie blockbuster genre.
Dexter Studios(206560, hereinafter “Dexter”), a comprehensive content specialist company, announced that it provided technical support for the VFX (visual effects) and DI (digital color grading) departments of the film ‘Colony’.
‘Colony’ follows isolated survivors inside a sealed building during a mysterious infection outbreak, as they face infected individuals who are evolving in unpredictable ways. Combining director Yeon Sang-ho’s trademark realism-grounded imagination, social messaging, and genre tension, the film surpassed 4 million admissions in just 14 days, setting a new record for the fastest release to achieve this feat this year. It is also enjoying immense success both domestically and internationally, topping the opening box office charts in major Asian regions including Malaysia, Taiwan, the Philippines, Singapore, and Hong Kong.
‘Colony’ holds deep significance as it encapsulates the accumulated collaboration expertise between Director Yeon Sang-ho and Dexter. Dexter’s VFX and DI divisions have previously worked together on numerous projects—including the films ‘Peninsula’ and ‘The Ugly’, Netflix’s ‘Jung_E’, ‘Parasyte: The Grey’, the ‘Hellbound’ series, and ‘Revelations’—joining forces to build the “Yeoniverse” spanning various genres such as disaster, action, creature features, and thrillers.
Based on its extensive experience in bringing various creatures and fantastical beings to life in projects like ‘The Monkey King the Legend Begins’, the ‘Alienoid’ series, ‘Project Silence’, and Netflix’s ‘Gyeongseong Creature’ series, Dexter’s VFX division realistically rendered the intricate details of the various creatures appearing in ‘Colony’.
Hong Jung-ho of Dexter’s VFX division, who served as the VFX Supervisor, stated, “For the monkey creature, a central creature in the play, we modeled it by varying the shape, color, and movement of the fur across different individuals. We also enhanced the scene details by applying VFX to the appearance of the infected and the slimy substances covering the locations.” He added, “In particular, by placing a massive crowd reproduced through motion capture alongside large-scale buildings and surrounding environments in downtown Seoul, we aimed to evoke an instinctive terror that feels like something you could actually encounter somewhere in reality.”
Dexter’s DI division designed the color palette and atmosphere so that audiences could intuitively feel the psychological shifts of the characters and the oppressive sense of the space where the infection spreads.
Park Jin-young of Dexter’s DI division, who was in charge of digital color grading, explained, “This is a project where we focused on contrast and texture expression to vividly convey the bizarre movements, expressions, and blood-stained faces of the zombies, as well as the texture of the mysterious substances.” She further noted, “We adjusted the light and tone to evoke feelings of claustrophobia and anxiety in the film’s enclosed spaces, and confusion and tension during the large-scale scenes where crowds clash with zombies, allowing the audience to vividly experience the fear and emotions of the characters on screen.”
Meanwhile, Dexter continues to expand its portfolio based on its unrivaled capabilities across the entire post-production spectrum—including VFX, DI, sound design and mixing, and virtual production—collaborating with domestic and international production companies across diverse domains such as theaters, OTT platforms, movies, dramas, and animation.
