The skeleton effects were terrifying for the vfx artists on Pirates of the Caribbean.

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
Industrial Light & Magic’s visual effects supervisor John Knoll kicked off the presentation. He observed that Pirates, first envisioned as needing just 160 effects shots, seemed by today’s standards to be “a working vacation.” But 675 shots were ultimately required to depict the vintage ships and skeletal pirates that figured prominently in the film.

The story’s conceit is that when the cursed pirates are illuminated by the moon they’re revealed to be skeletons, and Knoll said to “skeletonize” the characters and extend the actors’ performances in a seamless way was the most complex challenge. Animation supervisor Hal Hickel, called the task of replacing actors with sword-fighting skeletons, “Terrifying.” Continuity was key. They couldn’t use any flashy effects to cover the transitions from a photographed actor to a CG skeletal version every time the actor stepped into the moonlight.

Following the clip, Knoll and Hickel were joined onstage by effects coordinator Terry Frazee, who handled all the physical effects, and visual effects consultant Charles Gibson, (a previous Oscar winner for Babe.) Gibson stated that director Gore Verbinski wanted uninterrupted performances, and also wanted to be able to shoot with hand-held cameras, unconstrained by the demands of motion-control filming. “There were no concessions for visual effects.”

In fact, Knoll explained, only some of the miniature ships were shot with motion control. He remarked that that full-scale water effects were a challenge when compositing miniature ships, which were used for all the wide shots.

ILM’s Stefan Fangmeier brought his high seas experience on The Perfect Storm to Master and Commander. © and TM 2003 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. and Universal Studios and Miramax Film Corp. All rights reserved. Not for sal

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Announcing the presenters from director Peter Weir’s seafaring adventure, Richard Edlund quipped, “We’re getting our shipboard movies out of the way.” There were more than a few similarities, including the creation of vintage sailing ships and all that water. Of course, Weir’s film was different in that it was the only “invisible effects” offering of the evening.

Asylum visual effects supervisor Nathan McGuinness set up the reel by stressing that this assignment required “700 effects shots — on a film that wasn’t a visual effects film.” He explained that 90% was shot in a tank on a full-scale ship replica. The challenge was to make it feel realistic, and to make the extensive ocean shots appear organic. By compositing pieces of live-action water footage together, McGuinness says they assembled what was essentially “a giant jigsaw puzzle.”

While ILM visual effects supervisor Stefan Fangmeier didn’t get to comment before the reel was shown (the red light glowed before McGuinness finished speaking) he followed up with very specific details. Fangmeier noted that the reel included 300 cuts — 200 of which were visual effects. Weir was very wary of doing anything synthetic that would stand out, recalled Fangmeier, who’d been an Oscar nominee for The Perfect Storm. As a result, he admitted, “We had to sneak in CG water and CG debris.”

Since the major action was shot in a tank, special effects coordinator Dan Sudnick discussed the huge gimbal they used down at the Baja facility Fox had built for Titanic. For the long shots of ships at sea, Weta Workshop’s Richard Taylor created miniatures, leading Fangmeier to note, “We had two ships chasing each other that never existed in reality.”

Tasked with making Baja look like the Galapagos — among other illusions — visual effects designer Robert Stromberg explained that 22 full matte paintings were required for Master and Commander. The team ended its remarks with kudos to the roto artists. As Fangmeier observed, “Only 50 of these shots were bluescreen, so everything else was rotoscoped.”