How the Lord of the Rings was filmed and created brilliant special effects without computer graphics

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The 21st century has become the era of digital cinema. Today, most of the special effects are performed using computer graphics, but the creators of the cult trilogy "The Lord of the Rings" have managed in fairly simple but effective ways. The main task was to change the size of the characters.

Growth secret

Hobbits are short men, but not exactly crumbs either. In preparation for filming, we decided that their height would be 75% of the size of ordinary characters, i.e. about 120 cm. Most often, such problems were solved in cinematography with the involvement of "little people" - actors, whose roles have always included gnomes and similar fabulous crumbs. Fortunately, the director of the trilogy, Peter Jackson, immediately abandoned this knurled path. True, in order to achieve the desired effect, the entire film crew had to apply maximum resourcefulness. Some of the techniques were already well known, some were invented on the fly.

The method of forced perspective is actively used today to create original (and not so) photographs, in which, for example, a huge bride can hold a tiny groom in her hand. The secret is simple: to "reduce" the size of the figure, it is moved away from the camera, and the rest of the objects are filmed in full size.

The hobbits in the frame were moved from the lens a third further than the rest of the actors. That is, if the required distance from the camera was 10 m, then the halflings were filmed from a distance of 13.3 m. So they became smaller in general scenes. It was a little more difficult to "line up the frame" in those cases when the characters had to be next to each other. For example, when Frodo rides in the cart with Gandalf, Elijah Wood actually sat at a distance from Ian McKellen, but from a certain angle it is not noticeable, but the effect of perspective was achieved. This method can be described in two words: "cheap and cheerful" - with minimal costs, the result was excellent.

True, if you had to shoot moving objects in a forced perspective, the task became more difficult. True, here, too, long-established principles were used - the old technique with a moving camera, but since great accuracy was required so that the perspective would not get lost, an additional “motion control” technology was developed specifically for The Lord of the Rings.

Decorations to help

Of course, changing perspectives could not solve all the problems. To create the illusion of the size of the characters, they used large (for hobbits) and small (for the rest) decorations of the same places. We can see this effect in Bilbo's house, as well as in the Prancing Pony tavern. For filming, two sets of objects and decorations were made exactly the same, but differing in size.

Costumes played an equally important role. Some clothes were made huge and the actors had to wear stilts. This special effect, although it created the illusion that the hobbits were smaller than the others, turned out to be not the most practical: the helmets and armor of the orcs were one and a half times larger than normal sizes. It was inconvenient to play with heavy props, so constant breaks were required. Especially hit the orcs at the moment when they carried Merry and Pippin. Not only were the costumes heavy, but also two men had to be dragged! By the way, this method was also invented and first used in The Lord of the Rings.

Our little brothers and our big brothers

Still, I had to turn to the help of undersized actors. They were most often used in those shots where there were no close-ups, and for additional similarity they wore latex masks with the faces of the 4 main hobbits and wigs. The understudies saw almost nothing in them, but the shots turned out to be wonderful.

And for Gandalf, on the contrary, a similar actor of very tall stature was selected. He replaced the magician in those cases when it was necessary to show his large figure next to the halflings. Probably the most fun was the understudy … of the horse. The pony carrying the travelers' luggage across the pass was not real. The film crew did not know how a real animal would behave, so they decided not to tempt fate. The horse is almost invisible in the frame, and two girls coped with such an unusual role.

The ingenuity of the film crew is admirable, because they managed to create a film, the special effects of which are amazing even twenty years later. Most viewers are sure that "The Lord of the Rings" was filmed using computer technology, but in fact, the creators of the trilogy in most cases got along with "old-fashioned ways", but raised to an incredible level of skill.

The Lord of the Rings trilogy is undoubtedly included in the list of 10 great epics that amaze even the seasoned viewer with its scale