Vfx

We were really wondering how director Max Ksjonda created the mindblowing visuals in his clip Samoliot for the group 5’Nizza. Well, now we have the answer – it was mostly done in camera, with amazing prop work and rigging which was later cleaned up in post-production.

While LEGO has bent some of its rules about violence by offering weapons with some of its Star Wars sets, the brand is still pretty much about clean, wholesome fun. But that didn’t stop Nukazooka from imagining a LEGO movie based on the world of Grand Theft Auto.

(Spoilers) VFX house El Ranchito shares some sweet behind-the-scenes footage and effects shot breakdowns for Game of Thrones’ Season 7 penultimate episode, Beyond the Wall. That shot with the bony walker from behind is one of our favorite visuals of the entire series.

The always educational Captain Disillusion takes a break from debunking viral videos and questionable crowdfunding to kick off a new series about the masters of visual effects. The first episode looks at the ahead-of-their-time visuals in the Back to the Future trilogy.

Since we don’t speak Russian, we can’t vouch for the lyrics of 5’Nizza’s track, but we can stand up and applaud the frozen-in-time visual effects in this incredible music video from director Max Ksjonda. We’re dying to see a behind the scenes of how they shot this.

Cats get into all kinds of mischief when we’re away from home, so VFX artist Aaron Benitez decided to strap a GoPro Session action camera onto his cat Prince Michael to see what he does as soon as the boss man leaves for work.

There are millions of trick shot videos on YouTube (and we’ve featured our share of them.) Now, Captain Disillusion is here to burst our bubble – and all of those basketballs, footballs, tennis balls, and golf balls, as he shows us some of the tricks of the trade.

(Gore) These guys may have the world’s smallest guns, but that doesn’t stop them from throwing down. Corridor’s silly, but action-packed short reminds us that it’s not the size of your weapon, but the way that you use it.

Vehicle maker Honda and a team of talented artists pay tribute to the creativity and effort that goes into the production of modern motion pictures, peeling back the layers of the visual effects onion, and reminding us how little of what we see on screen these days is real.

Fernando Livschitz of Black Sheep Films messes with our expectations by swapping out everyday sights with wacky, unexpected, and downright impossible versions. We love the stubby airplanes and the two-wheeled buses.

“Who took these?” A couple has an intense argument. And it’s all because of you. Or at least someone you know. Director Noah Levenson’s customizeable short film uses photos from an Instagram account of your choice. Choose wisely.

YouTuber Buttered Side Down used an array of clever editing, camera tricks, and VFX to make his first-person quest for his lost frisbee far more daunting than it really was. The only thing better than this would be a VR version of the video.

A titan from the game Destiny stumbles onto its most horrific adversary yet – cute, cuddly, and deadly Care Bears. Freaking Rad’s video offers up cool weapons, comedy, cosplay, action, and VFX. (Thanks Grey!)

(Gore) Kaptainkristian highlights what David Fincher so deftly hides: the director’s extensive use of CGI and other digital effects in his films. From the Winklevoss twins to digitally perfected hair, Fincher stealthily bends reality in service of the story.

A battery that lights up. An outlet that’s a plug. A pill that’s a screw. Daihei Shibata has an ongoing series of short VFX videos that show ordinary objects with a twist. They originally aired in a Japanese industrial design show for kids called Design Ah!

The guys from Corridor have a little fun with shadowplay in this clip about a couple of graffiti artists who get more than they bargain for when they try to tag the wrong building. TL;DW: kids, don’t use spray paint.

Tinrocket’s Olli is an iOS app that lets you add hand drawn animated effects to photos and videos. You get a live preview and you can save still images or animated gifs and videos up to 10s long. It comes with six filters, with two more filter packs available to buy.

While we don’t normally think of Saturday Night Live for its visual effects, the show actually requires quite a few of them these days. Take a look at some of the work their VFX artists must deliver under the gun each week, often with less than 12 hours before airtime.

Launched in 1997, the Cassini space probe has been providing NASA with data about Saturn and the moon since 2004. It’s now running out of fuel. Erik Wernquist made this excellent CGI short film to sum up Cassini’s contributions and its final mission.

A report on the plight of visual effects artists. While a single actor can get millions of dollars for a film, VFX studios compete with each other for fixed bid contracts that often end up being unprofitable because of additional expenses from costly revisions. More here.

Want to stage a massive battle, fill an empty stadium, or take on a zombie horde? There was a time that you’d need thousands of extras to pull off such epic scenes, Golaem shows us some of the ways their software has been used to make movie, TV, and video game magic.

Effects house Framestore walks us through some of the 365+ insane and trippy visual effects sequences it created for Doctor Strange. Were Benedict Cumberbatch and Mads Mikkelsen even in this movie, or were they just their digital doubles?

These days, much of what we see on screen wasn’t there at the time of filming. This short video by Roy Peker explains how techniques such as green screen, rotoscoping, matchmove, CGI, and color grading can place actors and objects anywhere without ever being there.

McClatchy Video Lab’s documentary explores one of the nastiest secrets of the movie business, that visual effects studios and artists are often forced to work ridiculous hours, often at fixed bid pricing to meet unrealistic demands of movie studios. Premieres online on 2/22/17.

Reminiscent of the best in-camera visual trickery of the mighty Michel Gondry, director Oscar Hudson’s incredible music video for Bonobo and Nick Murphy’s chillwave track was created using forced perspectives with “a very small camera… and a very big set.”