< OUR WORK
Ubisoft / Heroes of Might and Magic III: Remake Cinematics
Erathia must not fall to their enemies
ABOUT
How a Fan-Made 3D City Opened the Door to Ubisoft
It all started with a passion project. Back in 2022, our Cinematic Director Radim "Hurricane" Zeifart rebuilt the iconic Castle city from Heroes III in 3D just to see what it could look like through a modern visual lens. That fan video caught the attention of Ubisoft’s Creative Director, sparking a conversation that eventually led to a 14-month production journey.
The result was ten narrative CGI scenes totaling nearly four minutes, designed to serve as the narrative backbone for the Restoration of Erathia campaign by reimagining 1990s cult lore for a modern audience.
CHALLENGE
Finding Queen Catherine and Working Across Time Zones
Recreating legendary 90s artwork in realistic 3D without losing the soul of the original game is a creative puzzle. The character of Queen Catherine alone went through dozens of face concepts and 3D iterations before landing on the final look that both Ubisoft and our team loved.
On top of the creative balancing act, our production team managed the entire project remotely with Ubisoft’s team based in Chengdu, China. Navigating tight schedules across continents meant our team was often uploading new renders late at night so the client could review them during their morning.
“In accordance with the Ubisoft development team's creative vision, our goal was to honor the emotional resonance of the original 90s cinematics while elevating them to contemporary visual standards. We paid extreme attention to optical behavior by replicating real Canon lens characteristics, organic lens flares, chromatic aberration, and tactile color grading to ensure these dark fantasy scenes felt tangible, filmic, and stripped of digital sterility.”
CRAFT
Ditching Digital Sterility for Analog Lens Artifacts
To make a dark fantasy world feel tangible and alive, we focused heavily on physical optical behavior. Instead of relying on raw 3D outputs, our CEO and Lead Compositor Marek Stolun built a custom compositing pipeline in NukeX to replicate the subtle imperfections of real vintage Canon lenses.
By hand-crafting organic chromatic aberration, bloom, lens flares, and tactile color grading, we stripped away the typical digital sterility of CGI. Every scene—from stormy oceans to candlelit castle chambers—was built to feel like real film rather than a synthetic render.
“What impressed us most was their dedication to always go above and beyond. The team actively brought their own creative ideas to realize our true vision. Working with All Animal Studio brings a truly refreshing approach. Beyond their technical setup, what we love most is the atmosphere. It is a genuine collaboration where we vibe and solve creative puzzles together as one team.”
WORKFLOW
A MacGyver Setup for Complex Rigging and Simulations
When you operate as a lean, agile team, you learn to be resourceful. We built a hybrid technical pipeline mixing Blender, ZBrush, Houdini, and Unreal Engine MetaHuman tools. When standard MetaHuman rigs didn't quite capture the sculpted shapes of our characters, our artists manually created custom shape keys in Blender to fix them shot by shot.
RESULT
From Premiering at Gamescom to Earning Long-Term Trust
The final cinematic sequences premiered globally during Opening Night Live at Gamescom 2026, giving millions of fans their first look at the official remake. For our Prague studio, the project was a major milestone. It proved that a dedicated, lore-focused team can execute realistic AAA cinematics at the highest technical level while staying adaptable, transparent, and easy to work with.
