Avatar: The Way of Water — Weta’s Joe Letteri on VFX Workflow

In 2009, James Cameron’s Avatar became the highest grossing film of all time. Now with the first sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water, he has returned to Pandora and the saga of the Sully family — Jake (Sam Worthington), his mind now permanently embedded in his blue, alien Na’vi body; his wife, Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña); and their four children. To create the alien world of The Way of Water, Cameron reteamed with another visionary – Weta’s VFX supervisor Joe Letteri, whose work on Avatar won him an Oscar. (He’s also won for The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and King Kong). I spoke with Letteri, who did a deep dive — pun intended — into how the team created all the immersive underwater sequences and cutting-edge VFX.