Retro
Category
Neal Scanlan explains how Babe the pig was puppeteered
‘When you watch a pig, it’s never still for one second.’
Behind the visual effects test that greenlit ‘Hollow Man’
VFX supe Scott E. Anderson looks back at digital humans, greenscreen paint and the genius casting of Kevin Bacon.
The animatronic sheep in ‘Babe’ almost lost their coats before filming even started
Plus other fun sheep stories from the movie, currently celebrating its 25th anniversary.
An admission: I totally forgot about the great CG spacesuits in ‘Space Cowboys’
Righting that wrong with the film’s visual effects supervisor.
Retro RenderMan: shading on ‘Finding Nemo’
How RenderMan was used for the film’s coral reef.
Tumultuous titles: the crazy story behind ‘Waterworld’s’ opening moments
One of several memorable Universal logo take-overs, and it even involved a giant globe…
Retro RenderMan: shading food for ‘Ratatouille’
How Pixar made cheese and bread and grapes look good enough to eat.
‘Stealth’ has the most memorable movie missile launch shot. Ever.
Here’s how it was made, including the last minute changes.
Miniaturization secrets: Eric Brevig on ‘The Indian in the Cupboard’
Celebrate the VFX of the now 25-year-old movie.
Did you know the finale of Ghost used video effects?
A look back at Boss Film’s end Heaven sequence.
Remember that pin table map from ‘X-Men’?
Here’s how it was simulated, two decades ago.
When motion capture puppets were all the rage
A look back at Boss Film’s input device for Species’ Sil.
Retro Renderman: Reflections in ‘Ratatouille’
A look back at brick maps and radiance caches.
‘Die Hard 2’: the story behind that famous final matte painting pullback
An iconic effect by ILM and an iconic effect in VFX history.
Six ‘Perfect Storm’ SFX stories
“After the second take, somebody gave me a baton.”
Retro RenderMan: The hair and fur of ‘Ratatouille’
The star of the film had 1,150,070 hairs (and it wasn’t Linguini).
The ‘Apollo 13’ effects you might not know about
Including the time VFX supe Rob Legato used an Evian spray bottle for outer-space particles.
Here’s what it took back in ’95 to make a digital stunt double of Sylvester Stallone
How mocap and motion blur were critical for these early digi-doubles.
‘The Great Escape with chickens’: Aardman’s Peter Lord reflects on ‘Chicken Run’
The stop-motion film is celebrating its 20th anniversary.
You could have bought this ‘Batman Forever’ miniature RC Batmobile for £20,000…
The film turns 25 this week.
A visual history of 3ds Max
Do you remember which version you first tried?
‘That will not work, Houston, we got bridges every few 100 yards’
Looking back at Rising Sun Pictures’ wild space shuttle crash-landing for ‘The Core’.
The failed motion capture that still resulted in one of ‘Total Recall’s’ best scenes
The film’s X-ray sequence seemed perfect for mocap…
The ‘real-time’ hand-drawn animatics process that made ‘Casper’ possible
And it was done on an…Amiga.
‘Mission: Impossible II’ – a virtual production game-changer
All about Manex’s approach to image-based rendering on the film, from a member of the team back then.