Director Nitesh Tiwari said that his new film Ramayana, which is said to be India’s most expensive film, has been created to offer a level of visual scale and craftsmanship that can rival the world’s top VFX productions. He told the audience at WAVES Film Bazaar that the blockbuster must be “visually stunning enough to become a global benchmark.”
Tiwari spoke about Prime Focus’ five-year process of virtual production, motion capture, and world-building, and detailed the ambition and pressure behind reimagining the mythological narrative, while fellow filmmakers Prasanth Varma and Ashwin Kumar emphasized that technology must serve the story, not drive it.
Directors at the forefront of India’s visual effects boom joined moderator Rajiv Chilaka of Green Gold Animation to discuss how technology is reshaping Indian cinema. They drew on their specific experiences with film in a conversation that explored India’s expanding creative capabilities, cutting-edge technology, and growing demand for high-quality VFX across film, streaming, and animation.
Nitesh Tiwari talks about the ambitions of ‘Ramayana’ and the scale and responsibility of imagining this epic story as a VFX film. “Ramayana deserves to be told with the grandeur it deserves…it’s so visually stunning that it becomes a benchmark for the entire world,” he said, adding that working with one of the world’s leading VFX studios (Prime Focus) was “scary, liberating and mind-boggling all at the same time.”
He described his five-year journey learning and adapting virtual production, motion capture, and world-building. “It took me two years to accept the fact that I was making a movie this big…I’m very comfortable now, but it wasn’t easy. There’s still a year until the first part comes out,” he said.
Director Prasanth Varma, whose Telugu superhero film Hanuman was a pan-India hit, stressed that technology alone cannot lead to success. “Movies work because they have a story, and all the other techniques, including VFX, help tell that story in a grand way.”
Varma, who is self-taught in VFX, editing and cinematography and is currently working on ‘Jai Hanuman’, revealed his hands-on approach. “You either give artists a lot of time or you have a lot of money…I didn’t have any money, but I did have time.”
Ashwin Kumar talks about his blockbuster anime Mahavattar Narsimha and how he made the film out of sheer determination. Moving on to his next project, ‘Mahabataar Parshuram’, the second in the ‘Mahabataar’ animated film universe, Kumar said AI is a useful catalyst to achieve the end result faster. Kumar believes that filmmaking will be redefined in the next five years. “We’re at the top right now. In five years, we’ll probably have AI movies that will make you cry.”
On the topic of animated films, Tiwari said that it is on his bucket list to create an animated film for the world based on Indian locations, Indian characters and stories.
The discussion highlighted how innovation, talent and ambition are moving visual effects forward in India and redefining what is possible in cinema, adding that VFX and technology are not the starting point for an idea, but can be an enabler.
WAVES Film Bazaar is a part of the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) market in Goa.
