Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. You know that disturbance in the
Speaker 1: force isn't an illusion. It's the beginning of another episode
Speaker 1: of tech stuff. My name is Chris Polette, and I
Speaker 1: am an editor here at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Apparently deceived into thinking that would be a cool new intro.
Speaker 1: Sitting across from me as usual is senior writer Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 1: Hello from a podcast from long long ago and far
Speaker 1: far away, and far far away. I am pretty far
Speaker 1: out there, so yeah, we wanted to talk today about
Speaker 1: a special visual effects studio named Industrial Light and Magic.
Speaker 1: And the reason why we decided to cover this particular
Speaker 1: topic is that, well, Industrial Light and Magic is part of,
Speaker 1: well one of the many things that George Lucas created,
Speaker 1: including things like Lucas Film. And that's been the news recently,
Speaker 1: because that's the recording of this podcast. It has not
Speaker 1: been that long since Disney announced its intention to acquire
Speaker 1: Lucas Film for the parents lie some of four point
Speaker 1: zero five billion with a B dollars, mostly all of
Speaker 1: which apparently will be donated to George Lucas's educational charity. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's pretty phenomenal George Lucas back in Twousen pledged that
Speaker 1: he was going to dedicate his wealth to philanthropic endeavors,
Speaker 1: mostly due uh to um more, mostly towards education, which
Speaker 1: kind of it's nice and it shows that he's following
Speaker 1: in the same sort of vein as other notable rich
Speaker 1: people and philanthropists like Bill Gates. Yeah, and that's not
Speaker 1: really what the the podcast is about. We're not talking
Speaker 1: about George and and things. But I did want to
Speaker 1: throw that in there simply because that was a pretty
Speaker 1: amazing thing to do. It's a very kind of bone
Speaker 1: would do that, very cool thing to do. Uh. It
Speaker 1: almost makes me not want to criticize him for some
Speaker 1: of the decisions he's made. Well, I think it gives
Speaker 1: us a picture of who he is as a person,
Speaker 1: and although he does see himself, I think as a
Speaker 1: as someone who is empowered to revise things that were
Speaker 1: previously released and then that that does infuriate a lot
Speaker 1: of people, among other things that he's done. But you know,
Speaker 1: I get the sense to that, Hey, he's not a
Speaker 1: bad guy. Of course that's what he wants us to think.
Speaker 1: But come on, come on, how who's going to go
Speaker 1: to the extent of of donating the majority of their
Speaker 1: wealth to education in order to convince the world they're
Speaker 1: not a bad guy. He's clearly a good guy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would say so. So he's a better guy than
Speaker 1: I am. So so well, well done, Mr Lucas. But
Speaker 1: but yeah, I mean he's he's also the same kind
Speaker 1: of person that is driven creatively. He's he's willing to
Speaker 1: come up with complete new uh businesses to support his
Speaker 1: creative habits. We might say, even though we may not
Speaker 1: necessarily agree with them. I would I would say personally
Speaker 1: for me that you know, his heart's in the right place.
Speaker 1: He's trying to create a good story and it doesn't
Speaker 1: always pan out. Sounds like you gotta remember back, all right.
Speaker 1: So he founded Industrial Light and Magic. Yes in Yes, Now,
Speaker 1: that's two years before the release of Star Wars A
Speaker 1: New Hope, one of the best documentaries ever to be made. Well,
Speaker 1: he um as a filmmaker, and his his filmmaking career
Speaker 1: began before that. Um but he you know, American Graffiti
Speaker 1: wasn't exactly um a, it wasn't as it wasn't a
Speaker 1: positive experience, wasn't It wasn't a special effects driven masterpiece.
Speaker 1: You know, it was a very good film. I liked it,
Speaker 1: but um, you know, it wasn't It wasn't the kind
Speaker 1: of film that that George Lucas is come to be
Speaker 1: known for. Well, he make a super effects blockbuster, which
Speaker 1: uh many would argue that he is responsible for and
Speaker 1: in part due to industrial Lite and magic. Really, the
Speaker 1: the two people I think who are responsible for the
Speaker 1: blockbuster special effects extravaganza are Lucas and Spielberg. And of
Speaker 1: course Spielberg has had quite a bit of involvement in
Speaker 1: uh several of Lucas's endeavors. But anyway, Yeah, he so
Speaker 1: he founded this visual effects company, and it was partly
Speaker 1: because Lucas, uh he he knew he wanted to do
Speaker 1: things a certain way, and in order to do that,
Speaker 1: he wanted to limit his dependence upon other companies as
Speaker 1: much as possible. So he started to make stuff. He said, well,
Speaker 1: there's no visual effects company out there that is going
Speaker 1: to do the stuff I need to have done, so
Speaker 1: I'm going to make it myself. And uh so he's
Speaker 1: kind of a hacker. Yeah, it really is a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, and and this was all due to necessity,
Speaker 1: you know, he wanted to have as much control all
Speaker 1: over the project as possible. In order to do that,
Speaker 1: and then that he had to build all this stuff,
Speaker 1: and so he set out to do it, and that's
Speaker 1: exactly what he did. It's kind of amazing. Well, there's
Speaker 1: a you know, the industrial light and magic has been
Speaker 1: responsible for many different advances in movie making technology over
Speaker 1: the years. Back in nine, one of the first things
Speaker 1: they developed was the Dixtra Flex camera system. That's named
Speaker 1: after John Distra, who was actually the lead designer on
Speaker 1: this camera design. Uh. And it's it was made because
Speaker 1: if you if well it's kind of hard to say,
Speaker 1: like if you if you saw The Star Wars and
Speaker 1: New Hope back in its cinematic release version, this is
Speaker 1: pre special edition. All the effects there for things like
Speaker 1: the ship battles and stuff, all the all the ships,
Speaker 1: all the the Death Star stuff, all that was made
Speaker 1: with practical effects, practical miniature models that so, so the
Speaker 1: X Wings going through the trench and Death Star that
Speaker 1: was all done with managers. So this is pre computer
Speaker 1: generated special effects in that sense. Yeah, and the sound
Speaker 1: to the the orchestra, Uh, would you know they would
Speaker 1: put these models on the Dolly and then the orchestra
Speaker 1: will be on the dolly behind them playing the music.
Speaker 1: No let's go a little too far there, Chris, but
Speaker 1: but this long way to go for a bad joke.
Speaker 1: This this camera, this camera was was special because in
Speaker 1: order to get the effect that Lucas wanted, he wanted
Speaker 1: the spaceship scenes to look like um, like dog fights,
Speaker 1: like airplane dog fights from World War two movies. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And and the reason that those uh that that film,
Speaker 1: uh and we're talking about existing film. Yeah, the reason
Speaker 1: that that film is so effective, I think is because
Speaker 1: it's been it was shot by another airplane in the
Speaker 1: air at the same time as a dog fight. And
Speaker 1: this this motion control photography that I LM developed for
Speaker 1: this UM used uh, basically was using cameras that moved
Speaker 1: in with the spaceship models, so it appeared that you
Speaker 1: were flying in the in the dog fights between the
Speaker 1: different fighters or the Millennium Falcon and the Tie fighters.
Speaker 1: So it was there was a real sense of movement
Speaker 1: right right. The camera was mounted on a crane, and
Speaker 1: the crane was mounted on a dolly track, So they
Speaker 1: don't do a Hello Dolly joke. I didn't anyone, Okay,
Speaker 1: So the so the crane could move back and forth
Speaker 1: along this track. The camera could could move in various
Speaker 1: ways to adjust the the pitch or the tilt of
Speaker 1: the of the camera's angle, so it could follow the
Speaker 1: motions of the miniature and make it you have this
Speaker 1: this really swoopy effect, where like Chris was saying, you're
Speaker 1: following the action very closely. And uh, it was a
Speaker 1: necessity for him to achieve the effect he wanted. So
Speaker 1: he builds this thing. Actually, he puts John Dixtra in
Speaker 1: charge of it, and John and his team built it.
Speaker 1: I call him John Smart. Uh, and they they shoot
Speaker 1: the movie and in nineteen seventy seven, Star Wars New
Speaker 1: Hope hits theaters and becomes an amazing success. The two
Speaker 1: movies that that really launched the era of blockbuster summer
Speaker 1: hits were Jaws and Star Wars. Yeah, um, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know what you get when you come up with
Speaker 1: a new kind of special effects technology an Academy Award. Yes,
Speaker 1: it won that for vis Visual Effects in nineteen seventy seven.
Speaker 1: John Steers, I think of him as dikest, John Dikes,
Speaker 1: Richard Grant mc grant mckeun, and Robert Black that can't
Speaker 1: say any of their names, I'm just gonna call him.
Speaker 1: They're all John now. Yeah, it's a matter of fact.
Speaker 1: They also got a Special Achievement Award in nineteen eighty
Speaker 1: Visual Effects. Right, but before we get to nineteen eighties,
Speaker 1: something happens in nineteen seventy nine that I want to
Speaker 1: talk about something, something special. There was a special division
Speaker 1: formed in nineteen seventy nine and Industrial Light and Magic.
Speaker 1: That division was called the Graphics Group, Uh, specializing in
Speaker 1: computer animation and effects. Wait, I feel like I should
Speaker 1: know who these guys are. When we get to nineteen
Speaker 1: eight six, it'll all become clear. But yeah, in nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy nine, the division, the Graphics Group, forms an Industrial
Speaker 1: Light and Magic. That division will become incredibly important and influential.
Speaker 1: And but oddly enough, their most influential days will be
Speaker 1: after they leave Lucas Filmy and Industrial Line Magic. So
Speaker 1: moving on, uh, nineteen eighty that's when Empire strikes back,
Speaker 1: the second greatest documentary. Actually, I think that people would
Speaker 1: argue that's better than Star Wars people, and you know,
Speaker 1: I actually prefer a New Hope to Empire. But I
Speaker 1: really love Empire too. It's just one of those things
Speaker 1: where you know, a new hope really resonates with me.
Speaker 1: But Empire is great, so Empire Strikes Back comes out.
Speaker 1: They do win the Special Achievement Academy Award for Visual
Speaker 1: Effects for that. The one Indiana Johnes and Raiders The
Speaker 1: Last Start Comes Out Now, that was another UH the
Speaker 1: project that UH had Spielberg's involvement, and they won the
Speaker 1: Academy Award for Visual Effects for that. They also made
Speaker 1: a movie Did you ever see Dragon Slayer? Okay, so
Speaker 1: I saw Dragon Slayer back when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: Dragon Slayer is a fantasy film and it's pretty much
Speaker 1: what you would think it is. It's a story about
Speaker 1: a young hero who UH sets out to slay a dragon.
Speaker 1: It's a little more complicated and that, but that's yeah.
Speaker 1: So they designed a new kind of filmmaker for this
Speaker 1: as well. They decided that there's a problem with working
Speaker 1: with practical effects for monsters that are um the go beyond,
Speaker 1: like something someone in just a suit, right, because one
Speaker 1: of the things you could do is you could do
Speaker 1: stop motion animation to create a monster effect, because it's
Speaker 1: it's hard to build a giant monster, so and it
Speaker 1: it really it's hard to make it look right too.
Speaker 1: It takes a lot of work. If I've shown my
Speaker 1: kids older monster movie bits, and it's kind of easy
Speaker 1: to on the one hand, when you grew up with
Speaker 1: pre I l M movies and technology and Jonathan and
Speaker 1: I probably barely qualify for that. But you know, you
Speaker 1: look at some of the old monster movies and you
Speaker 1: could see the zipper marks in the costumes and the
Speaker 1: older stuff. You don't, you're not freaked out by that anymore.
Speaker 1: But you know, the practice coal effects m could be
Speaker 1: done very very well, and even when they're done very
Speaker 1: very well, it still doesn't have the same effect that
Speaker 1: the newer ones do. And just it's it's just weird
Speaker 1: to think about now. But yeah, I mean, looking at
Speaker 1: the new stuff, it looks so very very real. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: back then, you know, with the practical effects, that's pretty
Speaker 1: much all they had at their their disposal at this point.
Speaker 1: Back they developed something called go motion and go Motion Uh.
Speaker 1: The way that they explain it on the Industrial Light
Speaker 1: and Magic website is that it worked by fusing quote,
Speaker 1: both electronic and mechanical components into a device that could
Speaker 1: record the dragon in Dragon Slayers movements based on an
Speaker 1: animator's design and play them back so the camera could
Speaker 1: capture them as they occurred. So the reason for this
Speaker 1: is because if they if they were to do it
Speaker 1: in traditional stop motion, there'd be no motion blur when
Speaker 1: something moves quickly, because because all you're doing is just
Speaker 1: taking a bunch of individual photographs really of objects that
Speaker 1: are not in motion, and then you're playing them back
Speaker 1: to make it look like the object was in motion.
Speaker 1: To get motion blur, the thing actually needs to be moving.
Speaker 1: It helps, but that's not how stop motion works, because
Speaker 1: the name stop Anyway, it was an interesting development. It
Speaker 1: was something that they had um created two again to
Speaker 1: meet the needs of the project that without having to
Speaker 1: you know, completely reinvent everything. Two They they got another
Speaker 1: Academy award. Um, I'm not gonna go through every Academy
Speaker 1: award Industrial Line Magic has won because that would be ridiculous.
Speaker 1: But they got it for one of my favorite films
Speaker 1: as a kid growing up, which was Et the Extraterrestrial. Y.
Speaker 1: I loved this movie as a kid. I think I
Speaker 1: must have seen it three or four times the summer
Speaker 1: that it came out, and I probably cried my eyes
Speaker 1: out every single time. I watched it because I'm a sap.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna sap all my life. I still am a sap.
Speaker 1: I probably could watch ET without crying now, but back
Speaker 1: as a kid, there was just no hope. Um. Anyway,
Speaker 1: that that was another very popular film made by h
Speaker 1: Lucas and Spielberg. So uh, and of course we should
Speaker 1: point out, uh, Lucas's involvement in some of these films
Speaker 1: is more of a kind of advisory sort of role.
Speaker 1: Industrial Light Magic worked on lots of projects, not just
Speaker 1: lucasfilm projects, which is why you know Et is an
Speaker 1: Amblin project, not lucasfilm. Well. I wanted to point that
Speaker 1: out too, that it would have been easy for George
Speaker 1: Lucas to restrict Industrial Light and Magic to working on
Speaker 1: his films. Yeah, but then we would have hardly any
Speaker 1: of them because he didn't do very many. Well, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's that's part of it. But I mean he could have.
Speaker 1: He could have done, say, uh, the Indiana Jones films
Speaker 1: and the Star Wars film stuff that he was intimately
Speaker 1: more intimately involved with, um, you know, the projects that
Speaker 1: he and Spielberg worked on together in some capacity, but
Speaker 1: he you know, they decided to spend this off into
Speaker 1: its own company, and in doing so they made I
Speaker 1: would argue that they made film richer for it. I
Speaker 1: mean you could say that, you know, working on on
Speaker 1: Star Trek two, um, you know and one of the
Speaker 1: greatest documentaries ever made ever boy. Um, So you might say, well,
Speaker 1: you know, start there, there's this whole Star Wars versus
Speaker 1: Star Trek, which I think is stilly anyway, um personally,
Speaker 1: but you know they You might say, well, you wouldn't
Speaker 1: necessarily you might want Star Wars to be the dominant
Speaker 1: uh science fiction space franchise. You know, why would you
Speaker 1: let him work on Star Trek. Well? I think, like
Speaker 1: I said, it really populated film them with the DNA
Speaker 1: of Industrial LIGHTE and Magic and made them the powerhouse
Speaker 1: that they are now. Um. And yeah, I mean they
Speaker 1: got a nomination for that too. Um. They did other
Speaker 1: work for other uh of the Star Wars and Star
Speaker 1: Trek films and going through you could see this in
Speaker 1: their the timeline on the Industrial LIGHTE and Magic website. Um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, they really and they got involved in stuff.
Speaker 1: Now you would say, also, these films are going to
Speaker 1: be heavily dependent on uh special effects, and you would
Speaker 1: expect that to be so, but um on other stuff
Speaker 1: like um, you know you would see it too, for
Speaker 1: things like Back to the Future, the Back to the
Speaker 1: Future franchise. But he also worked on the Industrial LIGHTE
Speaker 1: and magic, also worked on stuff like Out of Africa
Speaker 1: and Young Sherlock Holmes. Uh, stuff that had special effects.
Speaker 1: But some of this stuff is less special effect driven.
Speaker 1: The special effect the special and special effects in this
Speaker 1: case is making it look photo realist take rather than
Speaker 1: looking fantastic. Yeah, um yeah, I agree the uh and
Speaker 1: and you know there are other analogs we can compare
Speaker 1: this to, like the wet A Workshop, which did all
Speaker 1: the work for the Lord of the Rings movies, and
Speaker 1: the Hobbit has also done work for other other production companies.
Speaker 1: That's so they have done designed for lots of stuff,
Speaker 1: not just the Peter Jackson productions, so there are other
Speaker 1: similarities there. I'm glad you mentioned Young Sherlock Holmes. In
Speaker 1: five I LM achieved something no one had done before.
Speaker 1: They created the first computer generated character in a film,
Speaker 1: fully computer generated character. Uh. That Stained glass Man Stained
Speaker 1: Glass Man from Young Sherlock Holmes. Uh. In this case,
Speaker 1: what's happening for those of you who have not seen
Speaker 1: Young Sherlock Holmes, which is a pretty good movie that's
Speaker 1: slowly paced, but it's I enjoyed it. Uh it's it's
Speaker 1: got a lot of cute ref princes in it that
Speaker 1: clew you into the man that Holmes will become and
Speaker 1: actually the man that Watson will become as well, though
Speaker 1: it really messes up their ages anyway. Uh, there's there's this.
Speaker 1: The plot involves this stuff, this substance that causes people
Speaker 1: to hallucinate, and they hallucinate these terrifying visions that drive
Speaker 1: them to essentially suicide. And in this particular case, it's
Speaker 1: a character who is looking he's in a building with
Speaker 1: stained glass windows, and one of the stained glass figures
Speaker 1: comes to life, jumping out of the window and it's
Speaker 1: a night that is made out stained glass that stalks
Speaker 1: the guy. So that's the scene, and that was the
Speaker 1: first use of a computer a fully computer generated character
Speaker 1: in the film Who's stalking Nice. So in n six
Speaker 1: here's where the spinoff happens. That um that I mentioned.
Speaker 1: So back in seventy nine they had the Graphics Group
Speaker 1: division and eighties six lucasfilm spins off the Graphics Group
Speaker 1: Division as its own company, with a healthy dose of
Speaker 1: funding from a certain Mr. Steve Jobs who had kind
Speaker 1: of lost his job. Yeah he was, he had a
Speaker 1: gig and then they cut him loose. Yeah he he
Speaker 1: he had just founded Apple and then got pushed off
Speaker 1: to the very edges of that company and essentially they
Speaker 1: kind of fired him without saying he's fired. And then
Speaker 1: he said, all right, I guess I'm going and he left.
Speaker 1: And then but yeah, he poured in a great deal
Speaker 1: of money to the graphics group, which became Pixar. So
Speaker 1: Pixar at this time was again really kind of pioneering
Speaker 1: computer graphics, computer animation. It would of course be several
Speaker 1: years before um Pixar would enter in it's uh, it's
Speaker 1: long and fruitful relationship with Disney. Yes, so, but that
Speaker 1: that did have its you know, start way back then.
Speaker 1: And yeah they were um of course they weren't what
Speaker 1: they are now. But you know, and you might say,
Speaker 1: I can't believe that George Lucas allowed this to happen,
Speaker 1: But at the time it probably wasn't so clear cut,
Speaker 1: and it was very expensive to do what they were doing,
Speaker 1: and there there were there were no clear indicators at
Speaker 1: that time I mean, computer hardware wasn't what it is
Speaker 1: now either. It would be a good long decade before
Speaker 1: you start to see this really kind of payoff, But
Speaker 1: BOYD did it. So Industrial Line Magic entered in with
Speaker 1: a partnership with a little company called Kodak, which uh,
Speaker 1: of course has seen some hard times recently, but Kodak
Speaker 1: and I LM produced the first high resolution film input scanner.
Speaker 1: Now this was important because what I could let you
Speaker 1: do is digitally scan film, then you could edit it
Speaker 1: the computer, and then you would print it back out
Speaker 1: onto film, and uh, you wouldn't have to do all
Speaker 1: those edits manually using the traditional methods of cutting film
Speaker 1: and editing that way, so it gave a lot more
Speaker 1: versatility to the editing process. And you guys may not
Speaker 1: be aware of this, but it really is true that
Speaker 1: films are made in the editing booth. That you can
Speaker 1: shoot hours and hours and hours of footage of actors
Speaker 1: doing lines and and uh and running around and explosions
Speaker 1: and whatever. But until you get into the editing booth
Speaker 1: and put it all together, you do not have a movie.
Speaker 1: And in fact, I have seen evidence of amazing films
Speaker 1: coming from what you would imagine to be um worthless footage,
Speaker 1: and it's all due to a really creative editor finding
Speaker 1: ways to make something interesting when before, like might watch
Speaker 1: a sequence that originally was twelve minutes long and you think, wow,
Speaker 1: this is unusable, and then editor gets ahold of it
Speaker 1: and cuts it down to like seven and a half minutes,
Speaker 1: and suddenly it's phenomenal. And so, uh this is one
Speaker 1: of those important developments in the industry. Now, granted, this
Speaker 1: is only important as long as film remains a factor,
Speaker 1: and of course that doesn't always hold true. We've got
Speaker 1: a lot of digital productions out there. In fact, almost
Speaker 1: everything is digital now yea, and now of course, uh
Speaker 1: thanks to who was that anyway? Um foreshadowing. Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: although this device used charged couple device UM image sensor,
Speaker 1: it was not a digital camera in the way that
Speaker 1: we think of now. You know, this was a scanner,
Speaker 1: so it was you know, you you you you did
Speaker 1: use a film camera first and then use the scanner
Speaker 1: and then it would again put film out, so that
Speaker 1: you know, the projectors, the projectors we use were film projectors.
Speaker 1: They weren't digital yet, so uh yeah, going fully digital
Speaker 1: was not a viable option at this point. Um I
Speaker 1: d A nine. They created the first computer generated three
Speaker 1: dimensional fluid based character. And boy, how many fluid based
Speaker 1: characters I have loved in the cinema over the years.
Speaker 1: I can't think of any right now, apart from the
Speaker 1: alien water creature from the Abyss, which is what this
Speaker 1: is talking about. Yes, now, I saw well, I don't
Speaker 1: know if you if you argue that the terminators being
Speaker 1: sort of liquid, okay, yeah, and we'll get to the
Speaker 1: terminators as well, but yeah, I guess so so the
Speaker 1: T one thousand's that's really higher? So liquid metal? You know? No,
Speaker 1: it was. I remember I saw The Abyss in the theater,
Speaker 1: and I remember not thinking as much of the plot
Speaker 1: as I would have liked to have. But the effects
Speaker 1: were amazing. The effects were amazing, And I still remember
Speaker 1: watching Um, well, I shouldn't I suppose I shouldn't give
Speaker 1: away one spoiler, but the pseudopod at actually gets um
Speaker 1: it's it's a movie that came out in Okay, spoilers
Speaker 1: don't apply anymore. When the door shuts and cuts the pseudopods.
Speaker 1: I got to that point yet, I just get the
Speaker 1: point where the doors open and the pseudopods, right, there
Speaker 1: and it's friends, and I thought they were all going
Speaker 1: to have a picnic, and so the pseudopod when it
Speaker 1: gets cut, turns into real water and hit fo um.
Speaker 1: Just it was amazing, It was fantastic. Well yeah, and
Speaker 1: that that was one of those challenges. I mean, there
Speaker 1: are several things that have been challenges for computer graphics
Speaker 1: artists to recreate in a photo realistic way. Water was
Speaker 1: one of them. Fire is another one. Hair is a
Speaker 1: big one. So there are a lot of a lot
Speaker 1: of that that that various people working on computer graphics
Speaker 1: I've had to try and find a way of of
Speaker 1: designing so that it has that realistic feel on camera.
Speaker 1: And of course Pixar was doing a lot of this too,
Speaker 1: kind around the same time. So in ninety one they
Speaker 1: created the first computer graphics main character. This is the
Speaker 1: one you were referring to, the one that was in
Speaker 1: ninety one and in Terminator two Judgment Day, which I remember.
Speaker 1: I liked it a lot when it came out, and
Speaker 1: as the years go on, I start to change my
Speaker 1: opinion on that, mainly because of my love for the
Speaker 1: first film, even as schlocky and goofy as it is,
Speaker 1: because they kind of totally changed the t character Terminator
Speaker 1: character in that one. Anyway, ninety two they won their
Speaker 1: twelve Academy Award for Computer Graphics Work, which is pretty amazing.
Speaker 1: They also had the first time they with human skin
Speaker 1: texture computer generated human skin texture. This was for the
Speaker 1: movie Death Becomes Her. Did you see that one? No?
Speaker 1: I I have great effects and it's an interesting concept,
Speaker 1: but I don't know. I just did not click with me.
Speaker 1: But but again, people, the effects were amazing, so that's undeniable.
Speaker 1: The actual film, however, it left me a little cold.
Speaker 1: Death Becomes the Stiff, Yeah, there wasn't. That was a
Speaker 1: short time later when they actually created a character that
Speaker 1: seemed to breathe with skin, muscles and texture. This is
Speaker 1: a Jurassic Park now. Jurassic Park was one of those
Speaker 1: movies again that when it first came out, I remember
Speaker 1: that people were just completely stunned with the quality of
Speaker 1: the of the digital dinosaurs and that those movies you
Speaker 1: would watch scenes and you'd think, Okay, that had to
Speaker 1: be practical. They must have built a giant robot dinosaur
Speaker 1: for this scene. And then most times that was not
Speaker 1: the case. It was all computer generated. Uh. From today's standards.
Speaker 1: If you were to go back and watch Jurassic Park,
Speaker 1: I say it largely holds up. But there are definitely
Speaker 1: bits where you'll think, Okay, I can kind of tell
Speaker 1: that's computer generated. Apart from the fact that, yes, we
Speaker 1: know that dinosaurs aren't walking around right now, beyond that,
Speaker 1: I can tell its computer generated. Uh, And there are
Speaker 1: a couple of scenes that are more obvious than others.
Speaker 1: But you gotta thank you, know, for it was a
Speaker 1: pretty phenomenal achievement. And like I said, it more it
Speaker 1: holds up more than it doesn't. Right now. Again, another
Speaker 1: short jump to a film where they did their first
Speaker 1: computer graphic photo realistic here and for Yeah, and uh,
Speaker 1: it's interesting because they had a great model to work
Speaker 1: from with Robin Williams, who is probably the haryest, furiest
Speaker 1: man on the planet. You're looking at me, funny, that
Speaker 1: was a That was a joke. That was a joke.
Speaker 1: He's a hairy man. But that's a joke. Make jokes
Speaker 1: about that. They created the effects for all these computer
Speaker 1: generated animals, and these animals were supposed to look not
Speaker 1: They were supposed to like almost a slight fantasy version
Speaker 1: of the real animal. Because the idea was these were
Speaker 1: all generated from this magical board game, and so it
Speaker 1: wasn't They didn't need to look exactly like the real
Speaker 1: world version of those animals. They need to look a
Speaker 1: little hyper realistic, but not so much as to be distracting.
Speaker 1: So that was the goal they had for that film. Um,
Speaker 1: they also created uh, the first synthetic speaking character with
Speaker 1: distinct personality, so how they word it on their timeline,
Speaker 1: that would be Casper from Casper the Ghost, which uh
Speaker 1: gooda ghost I did not watch, but now these were
Speaker 1: This was a case where you're talking about the computer
Speaker 1: generated character that not only appears on screen, but has
Speaker 1: a large, an important presence in the film and has
Speaker 1: to be able to convey emotion and meeting and motive. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so that's you know, that's more challenge jing than
Speaker 1: creating something that looks real. You have to have something
Speaker 1: that's behaving in a realistic way and a believable way
Speaker 1: so that the audience has an emotional connection with that character.
Speaker 1: And that that's not easy to do. I mean computer
Speaker 1: animators and animators in general will tell you, you you know,
Speaker 1: once you develop that kind of style where you can
Speaker 1: create that on a reliable basis, it's an amazingly effective
Speaker 1: and useful tool. And before you get there, it is
Speaker 1: just a painstaking process thinking, well, you know, I created
Speaker 1: this character and the sad thing happens to this character,
Speaker 1: but no one seems to care. It's I mean, it's
Speaker 1: a tricky thing to to be able to invoke empathy
Speaker 1: in your audience. Eight they were awarded to I l
Speaker 1: M was awarded to patents for some techniques. One was
Speaker 1: for hair, fur and feathers. Uh. In this case it
Speaker 1: was the hair fur and feathers effects they made for
Speaker 1: another movie, Mighty Joe Young, which was a Yes, I
Speaker 1: saw the original Mighty Joe Young way back when I
Speaker 1: didn't see the remake. Um, this one was hair raising,
Speaker 1: I'm sure it was. And the other one was for
Speaker 1: facial animation, which was again created originally for the film Casper,
Speaker 1: but was also used on other movies like Men in Black. Nine,
Speaker 1: they created the most realistic digital human character ever seen
Speaker 1: in film, which was not the Daddy. It was the Mummy.
Speaker 1: Chris is not having a great morning right now. Hey,
Speaker 1: I just listened by the way slight tangent. I just
Speaker 1: listened to one of our older episodes and uh, and
Speaker 1: you ground my my will to live into the dirt
Speaker 1: with your puns. So you're gonna sit here and you're gonna,
Speaker 1: you're gonna, you're gonna endure this, all right. Two thousand um.
Speaker 1: That was with the the real time on character motion
Speaker 1: capture system developed for Star Wars episode one. So this
Speaker 1: is this is where they have someone favorite movie of
Speaker 1: all thank you, yeah, Star Wars episode one the phenominas,
Speaker 1: which I'll say this, I think it's the best of
Speaker 1: the prequels. All right, that's as much praise as I
Speaker 1: can give it. But anyway, also it has jar Jar,
Speaker 1: so do the other two prequels. It also has Darth
Speaker 1: Vader saying yippie. And I still say it's better than
Speaker 1: the other two. Um, but that's neither here nor there.
Speaker 1: What they developed was this motion capture system that worked
Speaker 1: in real time. Now this is really useful, and that
Speaker 1: you could get an actor wearing a special suit that
Speaker 1: would have sensors on it, or really it's not even sensors,
Speaker 1: it's just points of reference so for a camera to
Speaker 1: pick up um, and then the actor could physically portray
Speaker 1: a performance within a space, and then they take that
Speaker 1: information that the actor has created by moving through the
Speaker 1: space and the camera picks up. They feed it through
Speaker 1: software and that becomes the guideline for the computer generated
Speaker 1: character that will replace the physical actor who was moving
Speaker 1: through there. Jar Jar is an example of that. That
Speaker 1: was one of the characters that that used this um,
Speaker 1: this technology to create the performance. Now, while I do
Speaker 1: not much care for the character of jar Jar, I
Speaker 1: do admit that it was an interesting use of technology
Speaker 1: to be able to give a computer generated character more
Speaker 1: of a physical performance by actually mapping it to someone's
Speaker 1: real movements, because otherwise you've got animators trying to simulate
Speaker 1: real movements as best they can, and sometimes it works
Speaker 1: great and you watch and you think, oh, well, that
Speaker 1: looks real, and sometimes you're like, huh, that doesn't look
Speaker 1: right at all. Yeah, they're gonna use this technique again
Speaker 1: in some of the movies that are coming up to
Speaker 1: to pardon my pun, great effect, um some of my
Speaker 1: my favorite recent more recent movies. Yep. They also began
Speaker 1: to develop other stuff. In two thousand and one, they
Speaker 1: developed ambient occlusion. Yeah that's uh, that's just what it
Speaker 1: sounds like. Which there you go. They actually used this
Speaker 1: in the movie Pearl Harbor like it's just what it
Speaker 1: sounds like. I have no idea what you mean. Basically,
Speaker 1: they were using a combination of light and shadows that
Speaker 1: made the lighting appear realistic through the use of computer graphics.
Speaker 1: And they really it really showed uh, showed up for
Speaker 1: the first time in Pearl Harbor, the movie, not not
Speaker 1: the actual actual Pearl Harbor, not the place nor the
Speaker 1: historical event. Yes, but they Yeah, I mean with the
Speaker 1: the planes in the attack on the the American fleet
Speaker 1: and that you know, in the early morning hours. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, it required a lot of clever lighting. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And shadows. Yeah, you're talking about explosions, You're talking about
Speaker 1: shadows being cast by lots of different objects. You're talking
Speaker 1: about smoke. I mean, there's there are a lot of
Speaker 1: effects here that we kind of you know, you take
Speaker 1: for granted when you watch it on a film, but
Speaker 1: to be able to recreate it realistically in a computer
Speaker 1: environment is not easy, and that that's why a lot
Speaker 1: of this technology went toward. That same year, they also
Speaker 1: created onset visualization processes that would allow a filmmaker to
Speaker 1: put actors into an environment, let's say, like a big
Speaker 1: green screen environment and look at the virtual sets around
Speaker 1: the real actors, complete with the actual camera motions. UM,
Speaker 1: this was this is useful when you're making a movie
Speaker 1: where a lot of the backgrounds you create are digitally inserted.
Speaker 1: It's not it's not a computer animated film. It's still
Speaker 1: a live action film. But the the the sets might
Speaker 1: be virtual. And we saw this in a lot of
Speaker 1: the movies, like a lot of the Star Wars prequels
Speaker 1: had it. The example they give specifically within the Island
Speaker 1: timeline is with Steven Spielberg's movie AI Artificial Intelligence. Uh,
Speaker 1: there's another let down. A lot of movies here that
Speaker 1: I didn't really care for so much. Yeah, but back
Speaker 1: to the Future I loved. So there's there's that addressing park.
Speaker 1: I love that too. So it's okay, I'll just keep going,
Speaker 1: all right, two thousand three or do we were about
Speaker 1: to say something. I'm sorry, Well, I was going to
Speaker 1: point out that the uh for the ambient occlusion thing.
Speaker 1: They do point out that. UM a few years later
Speaker 1: in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences gave
Speaker 1: them a cy Tech Award for the ways in which
Speaker 1: ambient inclusion helped advance computer graphics in the motion picture industry. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, looking at it in retrospect, it
Speaker 1: may not have seemed like a big deal at the time.
Speaker 1: It may have seemed all that that movie is lit
Speaker 1: and you know, shadowed very well. But it has played
Speaker 1: a significant role in many, many other films since then.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, I mean there's what before we went
Speaker 1: too far? Sure, these these developments they're making are things
Speaker 1: that are are pushing forward the filmmaking industry across the
Speaker 1: entire industry, not just for a single movie. Uh, it
Speaker 1: really I l M has done a lot to shape
Speaker 1: the way movies are today. Uh. Without their influence, I
Speaker 1: would say that we'd be we'd have very different films
Speaker 1: right now if it were not for industrial line magic.
Speaker 1: Doesn't necessarily mean that they would be better or worse,
Speaker 1: but they would certainly be different. It would look so yeah,
Speaker 1: you mentioned the two thousand three or you mentioned the awards.
Speaker 1: They also got an award for the way that they
Speaker 1: found to render skin or translucent materials, uh, from the
Speaker 1: the good Old cy Tech Award. They also in two
Speaker 1: thousand four created a digital baby for a lemony snicket.
Speaker 1: It's a series of unfortunate events and it was this
Speaker 1: marked according to I l M the first time that
Speaker 1: you had a computer generated human character shown an extreme
Speaker 1: close up. So we're getting to the point now where
Speaker 1: photo realistic computer generated characters are within the realm of
Speaker 1: possibility for a serious filmmaker, um to the to the
Speaker 1: point where it's not necessarily going to be distracting when
Speaker 1: you watch it and you think, wow, that does not
Speaker 1: look real. Doesn't mean that everyone pulls it off successfully
Speaker 1: these days, but at least it's much more possible. Two
Speaker 1: thousand six, they developed imo cap, which was an image
Speaker 1: based performance capture system, and this was for one of
Speaker 1: the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. And that same year,
Speaker 1: two thousand six was when Disney made an acquisition. Disney
Speaker 1: purchased Pixar. So you remember back in that's when Pixar
Speaker 1: struck out on its own, not not struck out in
Speaker 1: the baseball sense, but set out as its own company
Speaker 1: under the the the financial support of Steve Jobs. While
Speaker 1: two thousand six, Disney makes a move to acquire that company, Pixar.
Speaker 1: Disney and Pixar had already been making several movies together
Speaker 1: for several years, and uh it was it was a
Speaker 1: strategic move to guarantee that Pixar would remain under the
Speaker 1: Disney family. And that also it was kind of a
Speaker 1: talent grab because John Lasseter, who was the head of
Speaker 1: Pixar at the time, would become the creative head of
Speaker 1: Walt Disney Animation as well as a imagineering So um
Speaker 1: that that little acquisition was made for seven point four
Speaker 1: billion dollars in stocks and other assets. So that made
Speaker 1: Steve Jobs the largest shareholder in Disney at that time
Speaker 1: and put him on the border directors to seven point
Speaker 1: four billion. Now, that to me is interesting because we
Speaker 1: already mentioned, you know, Disney's buying or trying to buy Lucasfilm.
Speaker 1: As of the recording of this put guest the deal
Speaker 1: has not been approved, but a Disney would be purchasing
Speaker 1: them for four point oh five billions. So you've got
Speaker 1: a division, a former division of Lucasfilm sold for uh,
Speaker 1: not quite twice as much as what the parent company
Speaker 1: sold for. That's interesting. So two thousand seven. Uh, at
Speaker 1: this point, I LM is working on creating a system
Speaker 1: to simulate fluid motion and this again is tricky. You know,
Speaker 1: we talked about getting a water effect is challenging, and
Speaker 1: that's true. It's also challenging to simulate fluid mechanics, especially
Speaker 1: you're talking about huge quantities, you know, with with the
Speaker 1: Pirates of the Caribbean movies, you're talking about ships on
Speaker 1: the ocean, So you need to be able to simulate
Speaker 1: the way the ocean really moves and the way that
Speaker 1: objects floating or otherwise you know, somehow in the water,
Speaker 1: how they would move as well. So they did of
Speaker 1: a lot of work in two thousand seven to perfect
Speaker 1: that technique. Yeah, they actually used a particular system that
Speaker 1: they called Zeno and UH an engine a graphics engine
Speaker 1: called fiz bam UM and this UH this was the
Speaker 1: series I was mentioning a few minutes ago, because they
Speaker 1: modeled these effects within what they were calling a virtual
Speaker 1: water tank. But of course in the in the last
Speaker 1: in the second and third movies, in the installment UM,
Speaker 1: there were lots of appearances by Davy Jones and his
Speaker 1: UH daydream Believers UH his crew, which were who had
Speaker 1: taken on aspects of sea life. They lived underwater UM
Speaker 1: and they there's a really cool picture out there where
Speaker 1: they show the UH Motion capture UM sticker things that
Speaker 1: they put on that the actors to UH while they
Speaker 1: are you know, pretending to be or they're acting as
Speaker 1: the crew and it's it's kind of cool because you
Speaker 1: can get weight. They don't have giant fish heads on um,
Speaker 1: but that's you know how they did that, and the
Speaker 1: amazing sea battle effects and all the things, the giant
Speaker 1: maelstrom um just amazing stuff. And then of course you
Speaker 1: know the YEP. And in two thousand and eight they
Speaker 1: began to work on Fez because fezes are cool. They
Speaker 1: are according to a doctor I know, yes, but no,
Speaker 1: Fez was the name of a facial animation system that
Speaker 1: they had been working on. And again this is to
Speaker 1: refine that that ability to capture an actor's performance to
Speaker 1: translate it to a computer generated character. This is one
Speaker 1: of those things that really is problematic. It's interest. It's
Speaker 1: an interesting question to ask who is ultimately responsible for
Speaker 1: a computer generated character's performance? Um, Because if you have
Speaker 1: a performance within a film that is award worthy, but
Speaker 1: it's a computer generated character, who do you give the
Speaker 1: award to? Do you give it to the animator who
Speaker 1: built or the people who built the textures and rendered
Speaker 1: everything and made it you know, that made sure they
Speaker 1: made all the tweaks to make the character look exactly
Speaker 1: the way the character looks? Do you give it to
Speaker 1: the actor who physically portrayed that character and it's that
Speaker 1: actor's movements that you are watching, even though it's a different, uh,
Speaker 1: computer generated body that's doing the motions, Ultimately it was
Speaker 1: an actor who went through those motions. Uh. Is it
Speaker 1: the voice actor who may or may not be the
Speaker 1: same person who did the physical motions. It's a it's
Speaker 1: a complicated question because the performance comes from so many
Speaker 1: different people working together to create this thing you're watching.
Speaker 1: And I know that that was one of those questions
Speaker 1: that came up during the Lord of Rings movies because
Speaker 1: there were people who were saying that Andy Serkis should
Speaker 1: be nominated for his performance as Gollum in those movies.
Speaker 1: But how much of that performance would you say is
Speaker 1: his versus the animators who created the Uh? I hesitate
Speaker 1: to use the word physical, but the the visual version
Speaker 1: of the character that you see on the screen. And
Speaker 1: it's I don't think there's an easy answer to that question.
Speaker 1: It may very well mean that one day we'll see
Speaker 1: a new category of award come up where it's best
Speaker 1: performance of some sort as opposed to just best actor
Speaker 1: or Best supporting actor or actress. Yes, wow, you waited
Speaker 1: all that time just to do that, all right. Two
Speaker 1: thousand nine we had the very GPU engine which was
Speaker 1: designed to create firestorms. So again you know, looking at
Speaker 1: the stuff that's hard to make look real on computer graphics.
Speaker 1: You know, fire and water, those big and for those
Speaker 1: are the big ones. Well, they they're working on the
Speaker 1: Harry Potter series of movies and they for the sixth film,
Speaker 1: they really needed to be able to have realistic fire effects.
Speaker 1: So you know, it's it's the I l M way
Speaker 1: when if you don't have a system that already doesn't,
Speaker 1: go build one. Well and they did, and so this
Speaker 1: kind of wraps up where they are today. I mean
Speaker 1: I M is not the only property outside of Lucasfilm
Speaker 1: that will be acquired by Disney if this deal goes through.
Speaker 1: Skywalker's sound is also in there. And you know, Lucas has,
Speaker 1: like we said, he's had a huge influence on the
Speaker 1: way movies are shown today. I mean th h X
Speaker 1: is another example, uh, which Disney I was also going
Speaker 1: to get. So really, when it comes down to the
Speaker 1: the technology behind filmmaking and film projection, film screening, Disney
Speaker 1: is making a huge move here and and some people
Speaker 1: are a little nervous about it. I've got friends who
Speaker 1: work in effects. They work for for affect houses that
Speaker 1: often will get contracted to work on companies UM, and
Speaker 1: some of these friends of mine are a little nervous
Speaker 1: because this is sort of showing a consolidation of effects
Speaker 1: houses and that could mean less competition and fewer opportunities
Speaker 1: for these artists. So there are things to worry about,
Speaker 1: depending upon what field you are in. Yeah, But nonetheless,
Speaker 1: I still think it will be interesting to see. And
Speaker 1: if some of the people leave UM, you know, they
Speaker 1: may very well take the ability to uh do these
Speaker 1: complex the knowledge that it takes to to build these
Speaker 1: complex effects with them, making the acquisition less valuable. There
Speaker 1: could there's always a chance that people could strike out
Speaker 1: and create their own uh companies as well and start
Speaker 1: competing at their old company. I mean that's happened several
Speaker 1: times in the past as well. So it's too early
Speaker 1: to say. But some of the movies Alam has worked
Speaker 1: on we've talked about, of course, the Star Wars series
Speaker 1: all the way from episode four through six and then
Speaker 1: one through three. Uh, the several Star Trek films generations
Speaker 1: first contact on Star Wars are Star Trek Wrath of
Speaker 1: con which is my favorite of all the Star Trek
Speaker 1: films because it's very cold. It's space is fine. Corinthian leather. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the Jurassic Park movies. Uh, you know had the mask
Speaker 1: Forrest Gump, Twister. Never had I felt that a cow
Speaker 1: really did fly past someone's windshield until I saw Twister.
Speaker 1: Mission Impossible three. They've they've worked on many, many, many movies.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you if you watch any film has
Speaker 1: a lot of special effects in it and you wait
Speaker 1: to the end. Uh, it's amazing how many of them
Speaker 1: have Industrial Light and Magic listed as at least part
Speaker 1: of the team that worked on the effects. Also, it's
Speaker 1: it's interesting to realize how many films you may not
Speaker 1: have realized have a lot of special effects in them
Speaker 1: because the special effects are to make the film look
Speaker 1: more like real life. Uh, Forrestcump is a good one.
Speaker 1: Although you could argue that no, no, that's clear because
Speaker 1: you know, Tom Hanks never actually shook hands with that
Speaker 1: many presidents still. But but even so, that's that's one
Speaker 1: of those where the special effects are there to create
Speaker 1: the story. But they're not. You know, it's not spectacle
Speaker 1: the way it would be in a big science fiction
Speaker 1: film or something. Right. So, yeah, they have had a
Speaker 1: monumental effect on the movie industry, definitely, and uh, I'm
Speaker 1: sure they will continue to do so. Even whether whether
Speaker 1: Disney's deal goes through or not. I'm sure it will
Speaker 1: remain a big player in the the effects industry. Now,
Speaker 1: as for my own opinion about Disney trying to to
Speaker 1: pert Is lucasfilm, I'm all for it. Disney purchased Marvel
Speaker 1: and then we got The Avengers, so I'd be happy
Speaker 1: to see someone take a stab at making a new
Speaker 1: Star Wars film. You know what Star Wars movie? I
Speaker 1: really want to see. What I want to see a
Speaker 1: Star Wars movie where we find out how Anakin became
Speaker 1: Darth Vader. That's what I want to see. How that's
Speaker 1: a burn. Okay, Guys, if you have anything you would
Speaker 1: like us to cover in future episodes of tech Stuff,
Speaker 1: I highly recommend you get in touch with us. Send
Speaker 1: us an email our addresses tech stuff at Discovery dot com,
Speaker 1: or you can contact us on Facebook or Twitter or
Speaker 1: handle at both of those locations. Is Text Stuff, H.
Speaker 1: S W and Chris and I will talk you again
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