This article was originally published on Mako
Have you ever wondered how your favorite films are made? How do they shoot a scene on a flying carpet, or make humans appear as if they're underwater? Creating a movie from start to finish is no easy feat, and often requires a lot of steps that we don't see in the finished product, but perhaps this is why they call it movie magic. If you're curious to know more about what goes on behind the scenes, grab some popcorn and read on!
1. Live-Action Aladdin
The 2019 adaption of the 1992 classic got a lot of things right - including the iconic magic carpet scene. To appear as if they were flying on a magic carpet, the actors sat on a hand-operated rig about 15 feet in the air. At the same time, a rough version of what the final product would be like was projected onto a screen so the director could have an idea.
Many of the scenes were actually filmed in Jordan to create an authentic feel. Some of the stunts were even real, like when Aladdin is chased through the market for stealing.
2. Invisible Man
This 2020 thriller tells the story of a scientist who fakes his own death and then makes himself invisible to torture his ex-girlfriend, played by Elizabeth Moss. One scene where he throws her across the room is actually a compilation of multiple shots, including Moss crawling around the room, her stunt double being thrown by someone in a green suit who would later be erased, and then Moss alone again for the rest of the scene.
To create this scene, they had to use a special kind of camera setup that could be controlled with programmed movements so that each take would be filmed in the exact same way.
3. Onward
Pixar's 'Onward' featured a character that had one unique difference from any of the studio's previous films - he only had legs. When Ian tries to resurrect his deceased father using magic in order to spend one more day with him, the spell goes wrong and leaves him with only the bottom half of his dad. Animators had to experiment with many techniques in order to make the movements of a pair of pants as realistic as possible.
This included having crew members wear khakis with a green suit on top in front of a green screen in order to see what the movements of a body with no top half would look like.
4. Bill & Ted Face the Music
In their latest adventure, Bill and Ted meet themselves - but in the future - when they time travel in order to steal a song written by their future selves to save the human race. To create the future versions of Bill and Ted, casts were made of the actors' bodies, which were then used to make suits that were worn to make their characters appear more muscular or fat.
The special effects department put effort into every last detail of the suits, even including life-like veins. To make future-Ted's belly look realistic, they added bags of beads to make it jiggle.
5. Titanic
There are few scenes more hotly debated than the death of Jack Dawson at the end of Titanic. Many argue that there was plenty of room for both him and Rose on the door, while others believe that it was not stable enough to support them both. Whichever side you're on, in reality, this scene was not filmed in the ice-cold waters of the Atlantic, but in the Belmont Plaza Olympic Pool in Los Angeles.
The length of the film was actually decided upon to pay homage to the time it took the real Titanic to sink - two hours and forty minutes. The ship hitting the iceberg was even portrayed in real-time.
6. Dolittle
In the newest depiction of everyone's favorite veterinarian Dr. Dolittle, tons of computer-generated animals add magic to the story as he tries to save the queen. Before the animals could be added in though, the actors needed to be filmed, and the interactions between them needed to be realistic. To help the actors know where to look and to get them something to interact with, stuffed animals were often used.
The CGI animals were added in later during post-production. In the scene where Dr. Dolittle rides an ostrich into Buckingham Palace, Robert Downey Jr. actually rode on a movable rig.
7. Live-Action The Lion King
The live-action adaption of the 90s fan-favorite "The Lion King" included some truly innovative film-making techniques. The actors performed their scenes on a real soundstage, and the producers used virtual reality to make the movie feel realistic while still sticking to the original plot. The cast and crew would put on headsets that would 'transport' them to the African Savannah, and from there they could map out how and where each scene would take place.
While the film featured over 30 incredibly life-like animal species, the sunrise over Pride Rock at the beginning is actually the only scene in the entire film that was not animated.
8. Rocketman
Rocketman, the story of Elton John throughout the 1970s, includes many theatrical and almost dream-like scenes, including a performance of Crocodile Rock at the Troubadour where the audience floats off the ground and John appears to be swimming through the air next to the piano. The scene feels as if gravity in the club was turned off, but in real life, Taron Egerton, the actor who played John was hooked up to wires.
Not everything in the film was done with special effects - the 'Rocketman' video really was filmed in a pool underwater, which Egerton described as quite a frightening experience to shoot.
9. Sonic
In the first film adaptation about our favorite little blue hedgehog, Sonic must defeat an evil genius who wants to experiment on him and pursue world domination. He teams up with some local police officers who help to protect him along the way. As Sonic is a cartoon, the actors needed something to interact with during the filming of scenes where a computer-generated Sonic would be added in later, and for many of these a blue dummy was used.
The Sonic film's initial reception was not good - when the trailer was released, many thought the character's design was too life-like, so he was redesigned to look more like the original cartoon.
10. Call of the Wild
Harrison Ford plays John Thorton in the fifth adaption of 'Call of the Wild,' while his furry friend Buck was actually played by motion capture performer Terry Notary. Notary wore a special suit during filming and was replaced with a CGI dog during post-production, but his presence on set gave the other actors a reference for the size and motions of Buck. Real dogs were brought in as a reference for the artists when creating CGI dog movements.
While Buck was computer-generated, his design was based on a real dog that the director and his wife adopted from a shelter. As fate would have it, the dog's name is 'Buckley.'
11. Voldemort's Nose
Creating Harry Potter's mortal enemy required lots of work by the makeup department. They had to cover actor Ralph Fiennes' eyebrows, apply tattoos that looked like veins to his head, and give him fake teeth, a process that took two hours each day. The special effects team also had their work cut out for them - they had to edit out his nose and put snake-like slits in its place in every shot that included Voldemort.
The visual effects supervisor for the film compared the work that went into editing out Fiennes' nose to creating a renaissance painting due to the level of detail and time it required.
12. Live-Action Mulan
Before she got down to business to defeat the Huns, the actress who played Mulan trained hours a day for months to prepare for the role. By the time filming began she was able to perform about 90% of her own stunts. She learned how to do archery, handle weapons, and even march properly, although, during scenes where she appears to be floating through the air, she was actually hooked up to a rig.
It was clear that the producers paid great attention to detail - over 5000 pieces of armor and prop weapons were used throughout the film. Still, we'd be lying if we said we didn't miss the music.
13. Avengers: Endgame
In the fourth film of the Avengers franchise, the Avengers must bring back their defeated allies for a climactic battle against the evil Thanos, who wants to wipe out half the universe. Among them is Thor, played by Chris Hemsworth. Thor went through a bit of a rough patch after losing his family and home planet Asgard, and when he's introduced in Endgame, it's after having spent years in a state of depression that caused him to gain weight.
Sometimes actors will actually gain weight to play a particular role, but for Endgame a custom bodysuit was made for Hemsworth to wear instead. It was supposedly quite difficult for him to move around in.
14. Project Power
In one scene of this 2020 action movie, Machine Gun Kelly's character bursts into flames, which required a lot of experimenting to figure out how to make look real. This process included setting actual stunt people on fire - in a controlled setting, of course, to see how this would appear on camera. In the end, they decided to use an LED suit that MGK wore under burn makeup. The flames were added in through CGI.
It took the makeup team over five hours to do Kelly's makeup. He eventually decided that it would be easier to keep his makeup on between shoots to avoid having to go through the process each day.
15. Live-Action Dumbo
To make 2019's live-action adaptation of 'Dumbo,' the human cast needed something to interact with as scenes involving the adorable baby elephant were filmed. To help them, a special actor known as a creature performer stood in Dumbo's place and moved the way an elephant would. He had to use stilts and learn to walk like an elephant as much as possible so that the visual effects team could add Dumbo in during post-production.
While Dumbo's claim to fame is that his oversized ears enable him to fly, creature performer Edd Osmund stayed firmly on the ground for all of his parts. Dumbo's flying scenes were added in with CGI.
16. Hagrid's Size
Rubeus Hagrid, Harry Potter's friend and the groundskeeper of Hogwarts is actually supposed to be half-giant, so the character needed to appear much taller than Robbie Coltrane, the actor who played him in all eight films. For some scenes, a taller body double who'd wear a mask was used, but for other scenes, altered sets, green screens, and camera angles were used to make Hagrid appear larger than the characters around him.
Scenes that took place in Hagrid's hut were actually filmed on two sets. A smaller set was used to make Coltrane look big, and a larger set was used to make the other characters look small by comparison.
17. Captain Marvel
Brie Larson kicked butt as Carol Danvers, also known as Captain Marvel, in the 2019 blockbuster of the same name. To create the scene where she falls from space and bursts through the atmosphere, the production team decided to use a combination of a digital body double and a real film of Larson. People in blue suits against a blue screen moved her around from underneath to make her appear as if she was really falling.
Larson had to work out with a trainer for months to get in shape before the movie began filming. She became so strong that she was able to perform many of her own stunts.
18. Daenerys' Dragons
We hate to disappoint you, but none of the dragons in Game of Thrones were real. They were created for the show using a combination of computer-generated images and on-set shots of actress Emilia Clarke, who played the dragons' mother Daenerys, riding a special mechanical bull-style rig. In a scene where Kit Harrington, who played Jon Snow, first meets the dragon named Drogon, the actor is actually petting a blue rock.
To create the magical shots from the dragons' perspective as they flew over Westeros, drones on rigs would film the background of the shot, and then Clarke and the CGI dragon would be added in later.
19. Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle
In the sequel to the classic 1995 adventure film, a group of teenagers is drawn into a video game and must win to be able to return to the real world. Like the original, the film also takes place in the jungle, so it features tons of CGI animals, including wild ostriches that chase Dr. Bravestone, played by The Rock. The group steals some jeeps in order to escape them.
While the ostriches were created to have life-like feathers and leave realistic footprints using CGI, The Rock's driving in the scene was real. The original Jumanji also used a mix of practice and special effects.
20. Interstellar
Sometimes CGI just can't compare with what can be achieved with good old-fashioned smoke and mirrors. Interstellar's director Christopher Nolan is well known for creating visually stunning films with minimal CGI. For the sets of Interstellar, images were taken before the actors were brought in and then displayed behind them as many scenes were filmed, and to mimic the conditions of a dust storm, crew members shoveled dirt in front of large fans.
Nolan's attention to detail covered every aspect of the film - he even worked with a real-life physicist from the California Institute of Technology to make sure everything was portrayed as accurately as possible.
21. Life of Pi
Life of Pi took place out on the open ocean, but for the purposes of filmmaking, the set was actually a wave tank that was built for the film in an abandoned airport in Taiwan. The tank held 1.7 million gallons of water, making it the largest self-generating tank in the world. To make the film more realistic, the crew was able to move one of the building's walls to allow sunlight in when necessary.
Wind machines were used to make the conditions mimic storms, and the animals on the boat with Pi were both real and computer-generated - including the tiger he called Richard Parker.
22. Quidditch
The costumes and broomsticks used to film Harry Potter's favorite sport were real, but unfortunately, the flying part was not. To film these scenes, the actors sat on broomsticks on rigs. The rigs were programmed with movements designed to make them look like they were flying in whatever way the scene called for, be it quidditch, escaping Death Eaters, or stealing a golden egg from a dragon during the Triwizard Tournament.
Wind was also used during filming to make the characters appear to be flying through the air. For some of the scenes, the actors actually had to jump on a trampoline to get the necessary shots.
23. Spider-Man: Homecoming
Spider-Man is back and ready to prove himself after his exploits with the Avengers in the 2017 chapter of the superheros' series. Tom Holland, who played Spider-Man in Homecoming, did all of his own stunts with the help of a few cables and rigs. To capture the scene on the ferry when Spidey fights The Vulture, producers created a full-size duplicate of the boat and filled it with water.
Another dupe was used to film the scene at the top of the Washington Monument. Holland climbed shorter walls on set while hooked up to wires to help pull him up.
24. The Jungle Book
The entire live-action adaptation of the 1967 cartoon was filmed using blue screen technology. About 70 different animal species appeared in the film, but only one human. To give Neel Sethi, the actor who played the main character Mowgli something to work with, the crew used prop animals including hand puppets. In the end, all of the visual effects required over 30,000,000 hours of total rendering - that's over 3,000 years!
To create the jungle where Mowgli lives, the visual effects artists used hundreds of photos from actual Indian jungles as references. Sethi was filmed, and then all of the parts were layered to create the final product.
25. Maleficient: Mistress of Evil
Angelina Jolie soared as the evil fairy Maleficent in the 2019 chapter Mistress of Evil. Her character spent so much time in the air that the crew had to use multiple methods of special and practical effects to make it all look real. Sometimes this included wires, and other times she was hooked up to a special pitchfork-like rig while people in blue suits on a bluescreen set would control her movements.
She even had two blue blades on upper her back that were used to mark the place where Maleficent's wings would later be added in by effects artists using CGI.
26. Aquaman
Aquaman goes down from the surface world to the underwater city of Atlantis in this 2018 action-packed blockbuster. During scenes that took place underwater, a technique known as dry for wet was used to make the actors appear as if they really were in Atlantis. This included things like smoke, colored light filters, and fans. Special rigs were also used to give them the appearance of gently bobbing from the waves.
Creating Atlantis took quite a lot of work from the effects artists - the city was made up of over 200 buildings and 150,000 ships that the team created one by one.
27. I Am Legend
Will Smith plays Robert Neville in this chilling post-apocalyptic thriller about a virus that wipes out most of humanity and most of the survivors into zombie-like creatures. Neville seems to be the last person left in New York, and as he ventures out one day is attacked by an infected dog. The scene was originally supposed to include a person in prosthetics to play the dog, but in the end, the studio went with CGI.
The effects team also had to make New York City look abandoned. To do this they first took video of the city, then used computers to remove all moving parts and add elements of destruction.
28. The Walk
The Walk tells the story of Philippe Petit, a high-wire artist who walked between the Twin Towers in 1974. Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who played Petit, trained with him for real in preparation for the role. All of the walks were filmed on a sound stage on a wire about 12 feet off the ground that was anchored by a pole. Some bits were done by Levitt while a stunt double took the more challenging bits.
To give himself some reference to how far apart the Towers actually were, Levitt walked the distance between the Twin Tower Memorial Pools. On set, only a small piece of one Tower was actually recreated.
29. Thor: Ragnorak
This scene was a joke and didn't actually make it into the film, but it does show a bit of how Chris Hemsworth was able to work with The Hulk in the third installment of the Thor series. Stunt artists like this would perform the Hulk's motions to give Hemsworth something to interact with on set, and visual effects artists added in complete images of the Hulk during post-production.
Hemsworth also had a stand-in that was much shorter than he is who would fill in during some of the scenes with the Hulk to make Thor appear smaller by comparison.
30. The Martian
The Martian tells the story of an astronaut whose crew leaves him behind. The movie may take place on Mars, but the landscape was actually filmed in the deserts of Jordan, and the scenes with actor Matt Damon were completed on a soundstage in Budapest. The production team utilized the largest 360-degree green screen stage in the world, and then matched all of the shots taken on it with the video they had from Jordan.
Other space movies such as Apollo 13 simulate zero-gravity conditions in what's known as a 'vomit comet,' to film extraterrestrial scenes, but for The Martian, they went old-school and just hooked the actors up to wires.
31. Godzilla: King of the Monsters
The story of Godzilla has been around since the 1950s and in 2019's King of the Monsters, the 400-foot lizard is back and must defeat King Ghidorah. The movie leads up to a final fight where the two monsters face-off, and creating this scene was no easy feat. Human eyes are quick to detect things that don't move naturally, so the artists had to present everything in a way that looked realistic.
Actors experimented wearing motion-capture suits with tails, and in post-production elements like buildings and rain were added in to show just how fast monsters that size would have moved - probably close to 200 miles per hour!
32. Guardians of the Galaxy
To escape capture by bounty hunters and save the universe, a space adventurer needs to befriend some unexpected creatures, including an adorable, if slightly slow, tree named Groot. About 90% of Guardians of the Galaxy was made using visual effects, including Groot, who was created using CGI. On set, a mime would stand where the character would later be filled in so as to give the other actors something to interact with.
The visual effects artists had to pay special attention to Groot's eyes to help him to look as lifelike as possible because as he's a tree the rest of his face wouldn't move much.
33. Shazam!
He may not be one of the most popular heroes, but that doesn't mean he's any less powerful. After being abandoned at a fair, Billy inherits the powers of a wizard and discovers he can turn into a superhero simply by saying the word "Shazam!" In one of the film's scenes, a city bus almost drives off of a bridge, and Shazam saves its passengers by catching the bus and placing it on the ground.
The producers used a mix of both practical and special effects. In reality, there were six buses on set. Some were small and some full-sized, depending on which angles needed to be filmed.
34. Beauty and the Beast
Actor Dan Stevens wasn't actually seen in the film, but there would have been no Beast in the 2017 adaptation of this Disney classic without him. For most of his parts, Stevens wore a motion-capture suit, but he and Emma Watson needed to be able to see each other to act, so separate shots of his face up close were filmed to create the Beast's facial expressions. The visual effects team then transferred everything onto the CGI beast.
While the other objects in the castle were also animated, one thing that was real was Belle's hometown. The production company built realistic sets where the opening sequence was filmed.
35. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
The second installment in The Hobbit franchise features Bilbo Baggins and his companions as they face a vicious dragon called Smaug. To play the role of the dragon, actor Benedict Cumberbatch wore a motion-capture suit and a special helmet with a camera that could track his facial expressions. After he'd performed all of the Smaug's scenes, a computer-generated image of a dragon was added that moved exactly how Cumberbatch did.
We have to commend Cumberbatch for being able to get through these scenes. A grown man laying on the ground, pretending to be a dragon certainly must have been an entertaining site. What a talent!