ILM

By the time 2022 rolls around, graphics will have advanced to the point where they are "indistinguishable from reality," says Industrial Light & Magic visual effects supervisor Kim Libreri.

ILM is working with LucasArts on upcoming third-person shooter Star Wars 1313, and in a new video interview with CVG, Libreri said it will one day be nigh impossible to spot the differences between real-time rendering and live action.

"It's an interesting time because with modern computer graphics hardware, the way it's going, it's gonna be pretty hard to tell the difference between something that … Read more

When the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences unveiled its Oscar nominations this morning, there were some very familiar names among the honorees.

Joe Letteri, for example. And Tim Burke and Scott Farrar.

These may not be people that appear regularly in the pages of "Us Weekly," but to those who follow the visual effects industry, they're on par with Meryl Streep and George Clooney.

Only one film can win the Oscar for best visual effects, but today, five films were nominated.

As usual, George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic was honored, this year for its … Read more

SAN FRANCISCO--Disney spent the last couple of decades making mermaids into friendly, lovely creatures bursting with curiosity and love (see "The Little Mermaid" and "Splash"). It took about a year's work from the visual-effects pros at Industrial Light and Magic to return the fair ladies of the sea to their classical, bloodthirsty ways.

To show off the effects studio's work on the billion-dollar-grossing "Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides" as it arrives on Blu-ray next month, ILM's Ben Snow (visual-effects supervisor) and Aaron McBride (art director) sat down with reporters at George Lucas' Presidio compound here earlier this month to discuss the challenges of creating mermaids beautiful enough to lure Johnny Depp to water and ferocious enough to devour him.

"Classically, mermaids were beautiful but deadly creatures," Snow said. "We were excited to bring them back to that tradition. But the challenge was developing creative concepts that preserved their beauty while making them scary again." … Read more

SAN FRANCISCO--When he started making his new film "Rango," director Gore Verbinski knew he wanted it to look and feel much like many of the Westerns it evokes: gritty, dirty, and sweaty.

"He wanted to be able to smell the breath of the characters," said Kevin Martel, the film's associate animation supervisor. "The feeling was that if you were to take a deep breath, you'd inhale all that dust and dirt, and you'd probably start coughing."

All joking aside, creating the look of a traditional Western was one of the biggest … Read more

SAN FRANCISCO--When George Lucas talks about the raison d'etre of his award-winning visual effects studio, Industrial Light & Magic, his logic might strike some in the bottom line-obsessed world of Hollywood as heretical.

"I started ILM to help make great movies," Lucas told CNET recently. "That's what we're here for. We're not here as a big moneymaking organization. We're not here as a business. We're here to make great movies."

Of course, any filmmaker would probably want to say something like that, but Lucas may well be the one person … Read more

If you asked the average moviegoer to name George Lucas' biggest influence on the film industry, they'd probably say "Star Wars." But while there's no arguing with the massive cultural and artistic impact of that film and its five sequels, a better answer might well be Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic.

To be sure, "Star Wars" and ILM are not unrelated--Lucas started ILM to create the visual effects for his groundbreaking movie. But the visual effects house has gone on to do a great deal more, and today is probably responsible for the look … Read more

This show is about one of the categories for the Academy Awards: visual effects. This year, there are three films up for awards in the visual effects category: Avatar, Star Trek, and District 9. We're going to be talking with Russell Earl of Industrial Light & Magic. Russell was co-visual effects supervisor for one of those films, Star Trek, and also worked on Transformers, Pearl Harbor, Pirates of the Caribbean, and two of the Star Wars movies.

Also joining us is CNET writer Daniel Terdiman, who covers digital media, culture, and gaming for the Geek Gestalt blog on CNET.

Show notes and talking points… Read more

In case you weren't paying attention, 2009 was a banner year for big, big visual effects movies.

And the teams that crafted the most impressive work were honored Tuesday morning, along with all the best and brightest in filmmaking, when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced the nominations for the 2010 Oscars.

Here at CNET News we have a special place in our heart, as you might expect, for visual-effects-heavy movies because of the fantastic amounts of technology and computing power that goes into them.

As usual, the Academy chose just three films as visual-effects nominees. … Read more

Update at 8:25 a.m. PST Feb. 2: "Avatar" has snagged nine Oscar nominations: visual effects, best picture, art direction, cinematography, directing, film editing, sound editing, sound mixing, and music (original score).

When the trumpets sound Tuesday morning and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announces its annual Oscar nominations, could there be any more of a sure thing than that James Cameron's mega-hit "Avatar" will grace the list of visual effects honorees?

After all, while many people have enjoyed the film's sprawling anti-colonialism storyline, there's little doubt that what … Read more