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Special Effects in Hollywood : Old School Vs New School

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Special Effects in Hollywood : Old School Vs New School Special effects in Hollywood : Old school vs New school From practical effects to Computer-generated imagery, the use of special effects in live-action cinema has gone through a long way since this medium has been invented. Let's take a look at the evolution of special effects in Hollywood live-action cinema. The Early Age of Special Effects From the very beginning, special effects have been one of cinema’s biggest advantages over other similar media. Although it is pretty much impossible to get a car to explode or a real-life scaled Dinosaur for a theatrical play, cinema does that with almost no problem. All you need to bring your exploding automobile or your hungry giant reptile to on-screen life is a valuable technique and a gifted visual effects supervisor. Oh, and a certain amount of money. Special effects should not only be considered an important part of cinema, but rather as a representation of what cinema truly is: the possibility of immerging the In The Nightmare (1896), George Melies plays banjo... Beside several copies of his spectator in anything that you own head. can imagine, for the price of his ticket. The creator of special Some Live-action Film Special Effects Milestones effects is considered to be George Melies, a French 1902: A Trip to The Moon The first sci-fi movie of History features rick photography, trompe-l'oeil, scale director who, at the beginning models, & matte painting. of the 20th century, took inspiration from his previous 1905: Intolerance Many fight scenes of this epic tale by career as a pretender to trick David W. Griffith include realistically the spectator he was seeing gruesome wound props. magic on screen. These first 1924: Die Nibelungen: Siegfried The legendary German hero fights attempts included “primitive” against a giant dragon puppet. effects such as the use of 1927: Metropolis The first realistic miniatures and large trompe-l'oeil sceneries or sets of cinema were used to trick the filming the same shot twice, but spectator into thinking the giant city of with an actor removed from Metropolis was real. the second one to create the 1933: King Kong The giant creatures of this classic are illusion he had suddenly stop-motion animated action figures. disappeared. From then, the 1939: The Wizard of Oz The intensive use of make-up and use of models, props, optical matte paintings was necessary to bring illusions and on-film tricks the World of Oz to life. became a standard in 1956: The Ten Commandments Pyrotechnics, large-scale sets, and trick Hollywood cinema, especially photography were needed to make this in genre movies. adaptation of the Bible believable. 1968: 2001: A Space Odyssey The first realistic footages of space travels are still convincing today. 1973: Westworld The first use of computer animation in cinema mimics a robot's infrared vision. 1984: The Last Starfighter First (missed) attempt to realistic computer-generated imagery to create action scenes featuring spaceships. 1988: The Abyss The “pseudopod” of the movie is made of realistic digitally-animated water. 1993: Jurassic Park 4 minutes of the film feature realistic CGI dinosaurs. 2001-2003: The Lord of Rings The antagonist Gollum is animated with Trilogy the help of motion capture, and the films shows many large-scale CGI Battles. 2009: Avatar The blue aliens are bring to life with the help of realistic motion capture. Ingeniosity and Audacity: “classic” effects The use of props, that is This kind of technique can also to say objects that are simply be combined, in the case of a displayed and used on set and scene showing a large model Matte paintings showed as they were filmed on in movement, with the use of the movie, without any post- props animated mecanically or A cheaper and riskier, yet playable production modifications, is with the help of stop-motion: variant of miniatures consists in the what we immediately think frame-by-frame animated use of painted panels of glass, about when talking about miniatures, also know as go- representing complex or huge special effects. It includes the motion in the world of live- sceneries in trompe-l'oeil, and superposed to the print or simply use of costumes, make-up, action cinema. This is for placed in front of the camera to puppets or animatronics instance the case for the ED-209 reproduce large sceneries. This (basically, remote-controlled from 1987 sci-fi classic Robocop, simple technique proves itself puppets) to recreate monsters a large walking machine that incredibly effective when cleverly or body modifications. From could not be built “for real”. used. the actor wearing prosthetic face to make him look older to One of the undeniable the 5-metres high mechanical qualities of what are creature, this includes a large nowadays considered “old range of possibilities. school” special effects is that, The use of on-set effects, as they are often done in front such as making fake rain or of the camera, they can still snow fall, using pyrotechnics to look convincing decades after produce large explosions, or having been shot. Well-made squibs and theatrical blood to and inventive special effects mimic bullet wounds as in the from pre-numerical era are final scene from Bonnie and timeless. The downside is that, Return of the Jedi: the matte is painted Clyde, where the protagonists if a practical or “on-film” effect with an empty space left... are gruesomely shot by the somehow appears Police, is also another form of unconvincing, it really is prop-using. unconvincing. Everybody can tell when a character falling off Another staple of a cliff is actually a dummy, practical effects is the inclusion when a robot is animated in of scale models on sets or stop-motion, when a creature is directly on films. Buildings, a bad plastic puppet with a vehicles or living creatures that limited range of animations, or would be way too expensive when the sky in which to build on scale 1 are often Superman is supposed to fly is reproduced as miniatures and actually a poorly-executed … Which will allow the picture to be filmed so to make believe they screen. superposed with a live-action footage. are actually much taller. It sometimes involves the model being placed directly on-set, with a strategical position to make believe it is part of the scenery. This trick exists with several variants, one being the “forced perspective”, an optical illusion that consists in superposing two objects, one in the forefront, another in the background, and to make believe they actually are in the same plane. Most of the time, models are shot in a studio as if they were real, and the prints could then be manipulated to insert pictures of the models in live-action shots, giving the impression that the actors really stand in front of a Special effects creator Douglas Trumbull building when it is behind a scale model from Blade Runner. actually a miniature. Pretty convincing. CGI: the Eldorado of visual effects In the early nineties, the T-1000 Robot from Terminator 2 on filmed sets are also common development of a new-school (1991). These artificial, semi- nowadays, as well as the of technology allowed for a liquid and polymorphic brand new generation of more creatures were then photorealistic visual effects: the followed by the Dinosaurs creation of computer-animated models that could be included from Jurassic Park (1993), a in live-action films. much bigger achievement Computer-generated considering the animators imagery existed and had been were working on monsters used in films before, notably in of flesh and blood. Since Tron or the Star Wars saga, yet then, CGI has been it rarely aimed to make the omnipresent in cinema and spectator feel like he or she Television, endlessly was watching a real object: improving itself. CGI models, usually “wire- frame” models, were mostly It is now well- there to represent what they known that the use of on- were: computer images, such set green or blue as holograms. But, thanks to “screens”, accessories or the innovations costumes is the basis of the use of CGI. To reproduce complex sceneries that would be impossible or too expensive to create as scale 1 models, actors are Marvel's The Avengers after and before filmed in front of blue or chroma keying. green sets (simply known numerical suppression of as “screens”): these bright existing accessories, such as computers had gone colors are then easily security cables to make stunts through during the numerically erased and less dangerous: in post- previous decade, it could replaced by 3D models of production, they are covered now be used to modify settings, creating the illusion with “numerical painting” that pictures in order to that the actors are indeed makes them totally create realistic moving around in them. This unnoticeable. This is the sceneries and technique is known as Chroma technique used in many shots creatures. Key compositing. Although it of Sam Raimi's Spiderman has been known and used trilogy. “Numerical painting” The first notable since the 1930s, it only found a is also used to add some successful attempts to produce large use in early 2000s, when elements to backgrounds. photorealistic CGI came from visual effects actually allowed Unlike 100% CGI landscapes two separate James Cameron for realistic incrustations. and characters, these minor movies: the water tentacle The addition of modifications are often totally from The Abyss (1989) and the Computer generated-elements impossible to notice. Motion capture CGI creatures are not only tricky to modelize with realistic skin and textures, they also are tricky to animate.
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