BBC Special: The Visual Effects of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

FalconBBCIn 2014 ILM opened a branch in London to work on the visual effects for Star Wars. BBC Click’s Spencer Kelly spoke to Mike Mulholland about some scenes he was working on. Check out the brief video after the jump.

 

The London branch of ILM worked on over 400 shots from The Force Awakens.

 

 

 

Probably you noticed those models in the background. You can see more details on Snoke’s body. It appears that he has been through a lot. His left hand is severely damaged and his claviculae aren’t that symmetrical.

 

SnokeBBC

 

Looks like the main damage came from the left side.

 

 

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59 thoughts on “BBC Special: The Visual Effects of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

  • February 24, 2016 at 6:46 pm
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    cool , ” practical effects and real sets”

    • February 24, 2016 at 10:31 pm
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      I have no words.

  • February 24, 2016 at 7:04 pm
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    You’re riling people up SWNN staff, whenever you post an article about VFX in a Star Wars movie.

    • February 24, 2016 at 7:27 pm
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      Borderline trolling at this point.

    • February 24, 2016 at 7:43 pm
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      An outlet has to report on news, not cater to fanboys.

  • February 24, 2016 at 7:07 pm
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    so much for those “PRAKTiCAL” effects

  • February 24, 2016 at 7:36 pm
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    The shot of the Falcon taking off looks horrible to me though.

    • February 24, 2016 at 10:23 pm
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      Looks awesome to me.

    • February 25, 2016 at 11:22 am
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      I agree. I wasn’t a big fan of the CGI in that shot. Most of the CGI was extremely impressive. However, I think some shots of the Falcon, Maz, and Snoke were a little sub-par with the CGI. But I guess you can’t win them all.

  • February 24, 2016 at 7:36 pm
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    Adverstising practical effects even when it’s blatant that there is a LOT of CG.

    • February 24, 2016 at 8:17 pm
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      Deliberate misinforming. I find it hilarious how many people accepted the the fact that effects (like that falcon shot in the picture) were ‘real’ only to be flabbergasted later on to learn that it was, in fact, CGI.

      • February 24, 2016 at 9:58 pm
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        AuDiOsAnE: Sounds like the Prequels in reverse.

        LUCAS: It’s like poetry… It… it rhymes…. ^_^

        AuDiOsAnE: My god! I’ve found Lucas! o_0

        *extends his PT Blu-Ray box to him in a helicopter shot*

      • February 24, 2016 at 11:18 pm
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        And some people said oh I could tell it was CG all along, when they hadn’t even thought of it until it they saw one of these vids.

    • February 24, 2016 at 10:30 pm
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      Did they ever say that the film would be ALL practical? All I remember them saying is that the film would have a lot of practical effects, and it did. It just blended them (seamlessly) with CGI, as any modern movie would. Get over it.

      • February 25, 2016 at 2:25 pm
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        They implied too many times that there’s a lot of practical effects, and the same way implied that BB-8 was fully practical. But BB wasn’t. I never had problems with CG, but it was annoying that they said always that TFA will have practical effects, literally in every interview and ad, and now it turns out that, well, much wasn’t. There were really many CG scenes, and I liked them.

  • February 24, 2016 at 7:39 pm
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    In reality I wasn’t surprised to any degree of how much CG was in the movie, there was still far more practical than many films today and my siblings picked up on that very positively.

  • February 24, 2016 at 7:44 pm
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    Well, this is not the only thing we got deceived on by marketing, right? How about the tons of Finn images as saber user, or no-Luke?

    • February 24, 2016 at 8:58 pm
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      No one ever sais it would be fully partical. Of course they would (and should) use CGI.

    • February 24, 2016 at 11:14 pm
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      If they had shown Luke all over the marketing peeople would have complained that all the more that he was barely in it.

      • February 24, 2016 at 11:15 pm
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        Like Phasma

        • February 25, 2016 at 2:08 am
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          Exactly.

  • February 24, 2016 at 7:51 pm
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    To anybody that is complianing about the “lack of” practical effects and real set, may I show you that this movie, and this video shows that there were TONS of practical effects. It is a beautiful blend of both practical and CG. What people complained about were the only CG sets that were often found in the prequels, and they wanted to let people know that they were going to more practical effects. Not once, NOT EVER did they say they would use no CG.

    What Episode VII ended up being was a beautiful mix of both and the use of practical effects and costumes for actor interaction where feasible. This is no different than what many other movies and TV shows do these days, adding CG to existing landscapes to make it look more “alien” or “otherworldly”. Game of Thrones is known for this as well, and it works for them too.

    I’m quite happy with the turnout.

    • February 24, 2016 at 8:16 pm
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      Who was complaining about the practical effects? Seems to me that the last 2 1/2 years was nothing but praise for miniatures, prosthetics, and real this-real that…

      • February 24, 2016 at 8:22 pm
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        Previous comments show that lots of people here were complaining. People seemed to think that it would ONLY be practical, but nobody ever said it would only be practical.

      • February 24, 2016 at 8:52 pm
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        Oh yeah. The prequels had a decent number of practical effects as well, I don’t deny that. I just think that recent movies seem to blend the two more seamlessly.

    • February 24, 2016 at 10:29 pm
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      Spamming links won’t help you, my friend. All that website shows is that the filmmakers were forced to create countless miniatures to replace the green screens that the actors were always standing in front of.

      • February 24, 2016 at 10:52 pm
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        boards.theforce.net/threads/practical-effects-in-the-prequels-sets-pictures-models-etc.50017310/

        • February 25, 2016 at 2:08 am
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          You need to re-read the first sentence of my comment, ’cause I’m not clicking your link.

          • February 25, 2016 at 11:14 am
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            The most important thing is the end result. Miniatures can be great when used correctly. And I applaud Lucas for using some in the PT as a form of practical effects. But I have to also criticize him because whatever the DP was doing with the film just made them look like fake CGI creations.

            And you also have a point as well about green screen being present for miniature insertion. You should still create as big of a set as possible for the actors to perform on, and then blend the miniatures in smaller areas in the background. There were a lot of miniatures in LOTR but they didn’t completely replace sets. That’s part of why it worked so well there.

  • February 24, 2016 at 8:00 pm
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    Anyone notice the editing error when Finn, Rey & BB-8 run up the ramp into the Falcon? Based on the shot of them running towards the falcon and where the ramp in located, they should have made the turn to run up the ramp from the other side.

    I’m guessing the position of the Falcon was moved/adjusted in post production.

    • February 24, 2016 at 9:02 pm
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      Yeh, that has been bugging me every time I see it.

      • February 24, 2016 at 9:21 pm
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        I get it now, it’s the closer up shot of the Falcon’s ramp, if they had cut the 1 to 2 seconds of the approach, and just showed them when they started up the actual ramp it would not be noticable. But all well. There are goofs in ALL the SW movies, or all movies in general.

        • February 24, 2016 at 9:33 pm
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          Yeh, i’m guessing they originally planned to have the falcons rear facing them and changed it to the more iconic shot at the last minute, as far as goofs go its not too bad anyway.

    • February 24, 2016 at 9:10 pm
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      Actually looked to me that they were running toward the correct side even though the actual ramp was on the right hand side. I just watched it again and they still seem to be running toward left side. But it could go either way, it’s not like they were veering right.

  • February 24, 2016 at 8:18 pm
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    Putting aside all of the comments of how much was CG versus practical, when I watch these types of videos I am amazed to find out things that I thought were practical effects were really CG. What I mean by this is that I am amazed at how good the CG is and how well it is blended with the real world sets. There are a couple of shots in the film where the effects could have been a bit better, but overall I am amazed at how good both the practical and CG effects are.

    • February 25, 2016 at 8:30 am
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      Yeah, I think TFA is a real benchmark for how much CG and Practical can do when they work together as a team.

      • February 25, 2016 at 10:55 am
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        I would also add the LOTR trilogy to that list. I think both films did a great job of blending practical and CGI. They really set the bar high for what movies should strive to be.

    • February 25, 2016 at 11:01 am
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      I was mostly surprised (maybe a little disappointed?) that there weren’t any miniatures used, and that they were all CGI instead. I’m torn. I’ve been a big fan of miniatures as I’ve found them to look extremely realistic when done correctly. And I always thought they would be the best things to use for things like Maz’s castle, starkiller base speech “podium,” star destroyers, etc.. Again, I was surprised to find out that these things were actually CGI because they looked so real. So, that’s why I’m torn. While I like miniatures, I can’t really be disappointed they weren’t used because the CGI was done so well for the shots that I thought were miniatures.

  • February 24, 2016 at 8:36 pm
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    It’s a movie, none of it is real. The movie looked great. Let it go.

    • February 24, 2016 at 10:00 pm
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      *sighs* Much anger I feel in him. Like his father.

  • February 24, 2016 at 10:19 pm
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    i have nothing against well done CGI in star wars ( even if i didnt like the CGI shots of the falcon crashing in the snow, tthat shot was too bland) what i do have serious problems with is Disney’s marketing department and selling this movie as the first SF film to go back to old school filmmaking and use a ton of practical stuff and constantly pointing blame at the prequels in a way that “those where all 100% blue screen and CGI and this time around we are doing this like the old days dear people” Now , us hardcore star wars fans know of course that they built a ton of sets and miniatures for the prequels. they BUILT Mos Espa on location in the desert, they BUILT all those podracers on location in the desert ,….. but thanks to the episode VII propaganda machine every casual movie fan going in to the prequels thinks nothing is real in those films. And thats a darn shame.

    • February 24, 2016 at 10:26 pm
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      When did Lucasfilm ever say that the prequels were 100% CGI? Never, that’s when. They concentrated on TFA’s practical efefcts, not the CGI of the prequels. That was us fans, not them. If you can hand me a quote/source of Lucasfilm trashing the prequels’ effects, then I’ll shut my mouth. But you can’t do that.

      • February 24, 2016 at 10:37 pm
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        ogh c mon, dont be that naive, that didnt have to say it out loud, we all had to read between the lines. the fact that they kept repeating it over and over “practical” had one function and one function only : to get the imagine in peoples minds that there would be no blu keys in this one. heck the first line spoken in the force awakens is ” this will start to make things right” if Mcdonalds repeats 500 times a day their stuff is all natural people will actually believe there will be no artificial crap in their burgers too.

        • February 24, 2016 at 11:09 pm
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          Not sure about that line (don’t t want to read too much into that since there may not be anything to read into after all with that line (besides, that’s what click-bait sites like Cinemablend do to pander to their readers whom most are nothing but haters)) but yeah, I agree, the constant berating and pandering with the whole practical effects talk was a bit on the nose.

          TUD, ever wonder why all these articles on the VFX in TFA are just coming out, particularly after the movie premiered?

          [*cough* possible strategy *cough* possible agenda *cough*]

          • February 24, 2016 at 11:11 pm
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            If it looks good to me I don’t care how it’s done. It is fun to watch the videos.

          • February 24, 2016 at 11:15 pm
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            I don’t care either (that is not the complaint here at all).

            This thread is about the marketing aspect of the movie based on the effects utilized in the movie. That’s all

          • February 25, 2016 at 2:22 am
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            Why? Nobody said there would be no CGI. They just focused more on practical effects than fix it in post. Not hard.

    • February 25, 2016 at 4:04 am
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      Not a single Clone Trooper was real…. i mean.. enough said.

      • February 25, 2016 at 10:52 am
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        This. 1,000x’s this. We all knew there would be CGI in TFA. But there’s absolutely no excuse as to why you can’t get actual extras to put on clone/storm trooper costumes and be physically present on set. I know the troopers are only one aspect of the film. But it’s a perfect example of the larger misuse of CGI throughout the PT, and why there was so much emphasis on practical effects for TFA.

        When people start bashing TFA for “lying” or whatever about CGI practical effects, I simply point them in the direction of these two images which pretty much say it all:

        • February 25, 2016 at 1:39 pm
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          yes , i dont care what they use ( practical or CGI , if it looks good, it looks good) imo these troopers look very good and real :

          • February 25, 2016 at 1:46 pm
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            and these look a bit fake (and no way they all practical )
            so again , its all perception. u know all the troopers in te prequels are CGI ,so automaticly it sucks ? im sure there are shots in ep 7 where the troopers are CGI, but since they made 50 real suits all is forgiven right ?
            did u know the sets on kamaino with Lama So and Taun We where actual miniatures ? Utapau’s Sinkholes = miniature. put people all think they Blue screens….i remember when attack of the clones came out everybody was darn impressed with the clone troopers fighting on geonosis stuff. i wonder what will happen in 15 years with the Rathar sequence ?
            all perception. TFA is a great fun star wars chapter. it is not the second coming where it seems we are not allowed to have a critical opinion anymore.

          • February 25, 2016 at 3:28 pm
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            Sure they where, i’m sure they never shot any of these things and never used them in the films….. what’s the difference between that procedure and say using rear projection in a movie like Aliens ? where u project miniatures behind actors on a set ? the essence still is : stuff got actually built and crafted and is not made up by a bunch of pixels. Why cant u just admit u a prequel basher ?

  • February 24, 2016 at 11:14 pm
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    R.I.P. Richard Bonehill (played Nien Nunb in ROTJ). 🙁

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