Gui'an supercomputing powers Ne Zha 2's spectacular special effects

The legendary mythological figure Nezha, beloved by generations, set the box office on fire during the Spring Festival holiday of the Year of the Snake. According to real-time data from Lighthouse Pro, as of midnight on Feb 7, Ne Zha: Demon Child Conquers the Sea, or Ne Zha 2, had surpassed 6.2 billion yuan in box office revenue, overtaking The Battle at Lake Changjin to claim the top spot on China's all-time box office charts.

Beyond its captivating story and vivid characters, the film's stunning visual effects have delivered a breathtaking cinematic experience. Behind these mesmerizing special effects lies the indispensable computing power of Gui'an New Area in Southwest China's Guizhou province.

The Gui'an Supercomputing Center is a pioneer in next-generation high-performance computing. [Photo/Guiyang news network]

"In the production of Ne Zha 2, the Gui'an Supercomputing Center played a crucial role in rendering by ensuring the stability of computing power. Our company provided high-performance rendering services for the film," said Liu Tingjuan, project manager of the technology R&D department at Gui'an New Area Science and Technology Innovation Industry Development Co.

As a State-owned enterprise specializing in digital intelligence technology applications, the company has seen remarkable growth in its rendering services. It utilizes the Gui'an Supercomputing Center, which is operated by the company.

Launched in late 2020, the Gui'an Supercomputing Center is a pioneer in next-generation high-performance computing. It currently operates 715 hardware devices with 1.3 PB of storage, powered by over 1,200 high-performance GPUs and a limited number of CPUs, delivering a peak performance of approximately 30 PFlops.

"Since its launch, the center has attracted numerous film production companies," Liu noted. So far, the center has contributed to the rendering of over 150 films and TV productions. In 2024 alone, it rendered 27 projects, including 12 films, 13 TV series, and two short films.

A long-standing challenge in filmmaking has been a lack of sufficient computing power, leading to prolonged rendering times. For large-scale productions requiring real-time rendering, virtual production, and 3D scene modeling, computing power is essential for both timely delivery and quality assurance.

For instance, Ne Zha 2 features over 1,900 special effect shots – an unprecedented feat in Chinese animation. Bringing these effects to life required processing massive amounts of data, AI training, and top-tier computing resources, all of which were provided by supercomputing centers.

Beyond image rendering, the center has expanded into fields such as biomedical calculation, astronomical and meteorological calculation, new-type industrialization computing, new energy big data, and seismic analysis for new-generation architecture. The center operates at an average server utilization rate of over 80 percent, having delivered approximately 28 million GPU-hours of computing power to areas such as Guangdong, Shanghai, Hubei, Sichuan and Guizhou, and supporting research projects over 3,000 times.

The extensive application of the Gui'an Supercomputing Center is a testament to Gui'an's rising prominence in computing power. As the core of the "China's Data Valley", Gui'an is making full use of its position as a China's hub node for nationally unified computing network and one of the country's top 10 data center clusters. By focusing on computing power, empowerment, and industry integration, it aims to become a leading innovation zone for the digital economy and a national computing power guarantee base.

By 2024, the Gui'an data center cluster was home to 23 large-scale data centers, with computing capacity exceeding 56 EFlops and intelligent computing accounting for over 95 percent. Guiyang City and Gui'an New Area have become leaders in domestic intelligent computing in China. Gui'an's focus on "computing power + industry" has been recognized by the State Council for its effectiveness in developing a national computing power guarantee base.