15 Major Milestones In Movie Special Effects

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15 Major Milestones In Movie Special Effects

Ah, the art of special effects! It is the stuff of dreams and nightmares, of amazement and terror. From the earliest days of cinema, filmmakers have been striving to create new and innovative ways to bring their stories to life. From Alfred Clark’s 1895 substitution shot to Hironobu Sakaguchi’s 2001 attempt at a photorealistic CGI movie, special effects have come a long way. 

This list is a tribute to the pioneers of special effects, the people who have pushed the boundaries of what is possible and made our movie-going experiences all the more enjoyable. From Edwin Porter’s compositing to George Lucas’s Industrial Light and Magic, these are the people who have revolutionized the world of special effects, and made it possible for us to experience the magic of cinema. So, without further ado, let’s take a look at some of the most significant milestones in special effects history – not counting blue cat-people in space.

Alfred Clark: The man who made special effects possible.

THE FIRST SPECIAL EFFECT 1895 CRACKED.COM Alfred Clark of the Edison Kinetoscope Company developed the substitution shot, which allowed for the first special effect in the film The Execution of Mary Queen of Scots, and this technique became a standard for special effects.

PBS 

Pioneering film: Edwin Porter’s ‘The Great Train Robbery.’

COMPOSITING 1903 CRACKED.COM Edwin Porter's The Great Train Robbery was a pioneering film that used innovative matte shots to composite two separate images, creating a realistic effect.

PBS / Shutterstock 

Shoot against a blue screen, print onto film, and voila!

BLUESCREENS APPLICATION TITES MAY-22-1916 1,273,435, Patented July 23, 1918, 1916 Tig.1 Fig.2. 6 GRACKED.COM The Williams Process is a variant of the bi-pack method used to create traveling mattes, which allow actors to move in front of painted elements. It involves shooting the actor against a blue screen and carefully printing the footage onto high-contrast film to generate a black silhouette of the actor against a white background.

Cinefix / Scadrenderq 

Sherlock Holmes meets cutting-edge tech.

CGI CHARACTER 1985 CRACKED.COM In 1985, Young Sherlock Holmes was the first full-length movie to feature a completely computer-generated character, which was achieved through the use of computer graphics by animator John Lasseter.

GWR / IMDB 

1995: The year "Toy Story" revolutionized cinema.

FULLY CGI MOVIE 1995 CRACKED.COM In 1995, Toy Story was released in theaters, becoming the first entirely computer-animated feature-length film. It was produced by Pixar with Steve Jobs serving as an executive producer, and was the highest grossing film of 1995, making $192 million in the US and $362 million worldwide.

EDN / Pixar 

“Antz” revolutionized water effects – scientists at Los Alamos made it possible.

CGI WATER IN A MOVIE 1998 CRACKED.COM Dreamworks' Antz (USA, 1998) was the first movie to use computer software to simulate the properties of water, prior to this, computer-generated fluid effects were drawn, frame by frame, using graphics programs. The detailed studies of fluid dynamics at the time were being carried out by scientists at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, USA.

GWR / Cornell Sun 

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