Yash Raj Films' in-house effects studio, yFX, has explained how it de-aged Bobby Deol for a key chapter of the spy film Alpha. The sequence takes the actor back to how he looked in his late-1990s films Soldier, Gupt and Barsaat. It became one of the most talked-about scenes in a film otherwise sold on its action.
yFX head Sherry Bharda says this is the first time the studio has used AI together with conventional effects across a whole sequence rather than on a few shots. Old footage of Deol in matching light and angles was scarce, which left little material to train on. She says skin, wrinkles and eyes each age differently, and small mistakes in any of them break the illusion.
To avoid the "dead eyes" look common in AI de-ageing, the team used a hybrid pipeline in which artists steered the AI and kept control of every shot. Director Shiv Rawail says the effect had to disappear so viewers stayed with the performance. Deol said seeing the years disappear from his own face was surreal. He said it was a first in his career, and that an actor still has to play the part truthfully whatever the technology does.
Alpha stars Alia Bhatt, Sharvari, Deol and Anil Kapoor, and was still in cinemas when the piece ran, with more than 92 crore rupees worldwide. The studio sees the sequence as a milestone for yFX and part of its continuing investment in effects technology.
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