Snoopy never saw hockey like this

<p>If NHL2K11 turns out to be next year's video game sensation, Santa Rosa residents can take pride in the Redwood Empire Ice Arena's starring role in making it.</p><p>No, you won't recognize the chalet-themed ice rink, also called Snoopy's Home Ice, or spot Snoopy pulling any cameos.</p><p>Despite 56 video cameras trained on the ice this week, the only objects recognizable on computer screens alongside the rink were the outlines of two hockey players staging moves at center ice.</p><p>They might as well have been in Canada.</p><p>Still, people can take pride knowing that their hometown rink was selected as the location to produce the game, using sophisticated motion-capture technology and animation that makes the Pong of yesteryear look like the work of a lesser-evolved species.</p><p>Novato-based 2K Sports, a rival of EA Sports, rented the Steele Lane ice rink for the week to film hockey moves. But this is no ordinary movie.</p><p>Standing at center ice, Eric Peter-Kaiser, a Venice Beach actor, and Christian Lalonde, a Hollywood writer and producer, staged what is known in hockey parlance as front-of-the-net tie-ups.</p><p>When the director said “action,” the men, who are both avid hockey players, locked sticks briefly, as if battling for the puck.</p><p>Red LED light raining down on the players reflected off markers attached strategically on their uniforms and back to the video cameras. The filtered images were then downloaded to the computers, where production staff monitored the action.</p><p>Animators eventually will use the images to produce the game's three-dimensional reality that today's sophisticated gamer demands.</p><p>They'll even build in illogical moves, such as a player shooting on his own goal, to satisfy what the 2K crew labels the “Little Billy Syndrome,” as in, you never know what little Billy will want to do when he grabs that controller.</p><p>Washington Capitals star Alex Ovechkin will be the featured player of the video game. To capture some of his signature moves the 2K crew threw down some ice outside Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas and had Ovechkin square off with another player.</p><p>Steve Park, whose business card for 2K describes him as a “mocapologist” in joking reference to the motion capture technology, said having star players in the game makes the experience more real.</p><p>Over the course of the week, the game's production crew anticipated filming an astonishing 1,300 hockey moves, some of them multiple times to get it exactly right.</p><p>The action includes fights.</p><p>“They want big hits,” said Peter-Kaiser, who played college hockey in New York and said he takes “pride in knowing how to get hurt.”</p><p>His film credits include a leading role in the 2004 Disney movie “Miracle,” which chronicled the amazing run of the 1980 U.S. men's Olympic hockey team.</p><p>Peter-Kaiser can't expect as much from this role — no one will recognize him from the game — but he'll still earn $1,500 for three days of work.</p><p>Not bad.</p><p>Kevin McCool, the arena manager, said the rink is a good fit for the video game company, in part because it is set up for such productions.</p><p>The LED lights and cameras, for instance, were relatively easy to install on beams already in place above the ice. McCool said producers also were happy to not have to use walkie-talkies or yell because the glass around the rink is lower than that of those in the NHL.</p><p>He declined to say how much it costs to shut the rink to the public for a week, but acknowledged the inconvenience to rink regulars.</p><p>McCool called 2K's selection of the rink an “honor,” one that he's hopeful can be repeated.</p><p>“We're hoping down the line to have the ice arena in the game,” he said.</p><p>Technically speaking, that's already the case.</p>