Industrial Light & Magic and Star Wars Revolutionizing The Film Industry.
Industrial Light & Magic, Revolutionizing the film industry with Star Wars: A New Hope, and Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.
Industrial Light & Magic was created by George Lucas to create the special effects that we see in Star Wars. Lucas recruited John Dykstra and Richard Edlund to lead the company and the work they have done revolutionized the film industry first with Star Wars: A New Hope and then with Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. Through their use of miniature models and blue screen technology, they were able to provide special effects, like the famous opening scene of A New Hope, of spaceships flying and alien like planets. They later went on the revolutionize the industry again with doing the special effects for The Phantom Menace, which was almost entirely made using Computer Generated Images (CGI). In this movie, including the rest of the prequels, the droids and space ships were almost all computer generated. What makes ILM even more amazing is that after Star Wars, it became the go to special effects company for almost all Hollywood movies.
Star Wars: A New Hope
In 1977, Star Wars: A New Hope released to theaters. When it first released, there was little known about the film and therefore not many people went to go see it initially. Once the film was re-introduced to theaters during the summer of 1977, the film exploded and created what we know as blockbuster movies today. It was the first movie where people actually camped out many nights in advance to view the film, and many got back in line immediately after viewing the movie. The film made around $2 billion with adjusted inflation for today. One of the main differentiators for this film was the incredible use of special effects that had not been seen in movies to date. With a team set up by George Lucas, ILM was able to use “ Youth and ignorance” to “drive eye-popping ‘Star Wars’ effects.”
ILM and Star Wars: A New Hope
VFX Techniques:
ILM made Star Wars with the use of creative camera and special effect tactics. One of the simpler tactics that they used was to paint landscapes and extensions of props onto glass and projected light through it, a technique called VFX. This allowed Lucas and the film team to not have to use a lot of space and money trying to build full models. The extension of prop paintings added a three-dimensional effect to the existing set. The glass allowed light to be projected through to give scenery a realistic feel to it.
Small Scale Models:
Another way Star Wars and ILM changed the special effect industry was through their use of to scale miniature models and puppetry. The use of small scale models was not new to the film industry, but ILM revolutionized it by building a new computer controlled camera system called “Dykstraflex”. This allowed ILM to add a blue screen behind the model and keep the model steady, while moving the camera around the object to simulate motion. Some of Star Wars most famous scenes were done with this technology, including the opening scene of Star Wars: A New Hope and the Death Star. With this effect, the space battle scenes, where they are flying through the trenches of the Death Star, seem so realistic. Part of the challenge with using this technique, is that they had to make everything by hand. George Lucas is very detail oriented and would not settle for anything less than perfect. Not only did they have to make them by hand, but for much of the scenes when they blew part of the model up, if the shot was not right, they had to rebuild the entire model. This caused for the filming of Star Wars: A New Hope to be behind schedule. It paid off in the end as the special effects in the movie were nothing that people had seen before.
Other Techniques:
Some of the techniques ILM used in star wars was just plan tedious work. They dedicated many hours a week working over time to get special effects done. This especially came in when doing the effects for the lightsabers and blasters. All of the special effects for these were done post production and required for ILM to go frame by frame and have a special effects artist draw the lightsaber animation. With George Lucas leading the team and the dedication to get work perfect by ILM, allowed them to do already established special effect techniques better then anyone else and be creative enough to develop new special effect techniques.
Star Wars: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars: The Phantom Menace is the first movie of the Star Wars prequels. The movie was released in 1999, which got $64,820,970 on opening weekend. This story followed the event that lead to Darth Vader’s fall to the dark side. Once again, George Lucas was able to provide the consumer with a film that was nothing like people had seen before. Just as in Star Wars: A New Hope, ILM and Lucas were able revolutionize the film industry. This time, ILM used computer generated images (CGI) on top of live film, able to bring more of the Star Wars universe to life.
ILM and Star Wars: The Phantom Menace
CGI
ILM and Lucas were able to revamp many of their puppet characters and the spaceships with the use of CGI. It allowed them to make characters like Yoda even more life like and able to move with fluid motion. The Tie Fighters and Y-wings were able to move better on screen then with using blue screen technology. They were even able to fully animate a character in a live-action film, with Jar Jar. This had never been done before, which made it a break through for the film industry, but the fans did not react well to the actual character of Jar Jar. The movie included 2,000 digital visual effects shots, which was more then any movie before it. What this really allowed for Lucas to do, was to make a Star Wars movie exactly as he pictured it. Some disliked this use of CGI on Star Wars and has caused some what of a divide between fans who like the prequels and the fans that like the original trilogy.
Conclusion
In all, ILM showcased their industry changing special effect techniques through Star Wars. With the release of Star Wars: A New Hope, people were able to experience a science fiction film like they have never before. With their extremely, detail oriented small scale models and a blue screen, they were able to make people scratch their heads in how ILM and Lucas were able to produce it. Then again in 1999 when Star Wars: The Phantom Menace released, they showed how advanced they were with CGI, with another special effects breakthrough with having such detailed fully animated characters.
ILM has been doing the special effects for the Star Wars movies ever since. Their newest project will be Star Wars: Episode IX. It is set to release in the winter of 2019. It is going to be exciting to see how ILM makes this movie and if they implement any more industry changing techniques.
