King Kong: The Practical Effects Wonder - Documentary

King Kong 1933 a story about Hollywood fame Adventure love I guess I love you, my dad and a giant gorilla who is really just an 18-inch wire figure covered in cotton and rabbit fur. Cinema had just moved from silent cinema to sound cinema, that is, technology and cinema. It was still developing and improving its basic fundamentals, such as audio, so the special

effects

were limited and simply required a lot of effort and creativity. King Kong 1933 was a great pioneer in

practical

effects

in films that showed the possibilities of a person, a roll of film and a Willis camera.

O'Brien was a special effects pioneer who experimented with stop motion and eventually had claymation comedy shorts financed by Thomas Edison O'Brien's 1925 film The Lost World, which featured many of the same techniques he had used. in King Kong, which shows that he had a lot of practice. and some

practical

effects since his last project of the time was a stop-motion film called Creation about a ship crew visiting an island full of prehistoric dinosaurs sounds familiar, this was clearly a pattern of his consideration that the lost world too It was about a ship's crew visiting an island full of dinosaurs.

His ability to refine the movement of these creatures and place real-life people in the same world was incredible when technology was so limited that these environments and effects were strictly practical and were made with the hands of Willis O'Brien without Him, King Kong, would really be nothing. Brian's creation movie was in the works, but unfortunately his team said the story wasn't good. Luckily for him, Marion C Cooper had joined the team and was thin

king

about his next big movie. The beast. Marion C Cooper was a

documentary

. The filmmaker who often worked alongside his best friend Ernest B showed Sack Cooper and showed Sack were two intrepid creatives who were fascinated with adventure and war after meeting during World War II.

The two became best friends and channeled their creativity into documentaries about wild animals they would make. Cooper saw tigers up close for the sake of his images, Cooper had become interested in gorillas and with the help of Shoedazzak's wife, Ruth Rose, who had experience writing the script for The Beast, while loo

king

for a way to create his monstrous gorilla, Cooper saw O. Brien's creativity and potential for his film shortly after O'Brien's creation became King Kong, the Eighth Wonder using elements of Willis O'Brien's earlier ideas. O'Brien's idea for the log scene was reused. The dinosaur figures he created were used for Kong's spite scenes. and even the Skull Island idea was used, Kong actually had at least three puppets built for the project, two of the puppets were 18 inches tall and the other was 24 inches tall for the New York City scenes so that to look even bigger compared to the buildings they also made a miniature Kong for the long shots of him climbing the Empire State Building, which was also a miniature set.

The two 18-inch puppets are recognizable to most, one has a shorter face and the other is known for its longer face. This is because creating the face was extremely difficult, making it exactly the same as the other one, the figure was a wire skeleton with joints everywhere including the fingers, cotton was strategically wrapped around the metal skeleton and tied with thread sewing to create muscle, he built a diaphragm in his chest. so that during production it would move in and out to replicate Kong's breathing movement, then it was covered in rabbit fur. In the film you can see his fur fluttering, which was actually O'Brien's hands moving the figure between shots of this little air. fortunately he was overshadowed by critics who thought he was amazing, you could see the chill on his body, the stop-motion process was labor intensive, a surface meter was used to monitor Kong's progress as well as to create References and key points in its life-size robotic movement figures were also made.

Sculptor Marcel Delgado and his brother Víctor created an oversized hand and foot and a life-sized bus for Kong this way the actors could stand right next to him in close-ups like when we see shots. of andero in his hand or right next to his face or when he stomps on the natives when he escapes because they had to have live action and stop motion in the same shots, so the film required intense strategy if a shot included Kong trampling the city. around the people this had to be stop motion in O'Brien's studio but it stays in the same scene he lifts Anne up and we want to see a close up this has to be another completely different shot of Anne lying on the giant hand in a In another studio setting, can you imagine the shooting schedule and careful planning it took to make this film, not to mention that working with stop-motion film was incredibly risky and difficult after development?

If there was a mistake in the stop-motion it had to be redone, it took a lot of patience and skill to do it but of course Willis O'Brien and his team had what it took for the set of Skull Island. O'Brien made sure the scenes had realistic depth and went beyond what was imaginable. The trees were wood covered in clay and tissue paper, the rocks and dirt were plaster and the foliage consisted of real plants and fine cut copper, all the little vines and pieces of leaves were carefully and strategically placed and emphasized the details, then a matte painting was placed a few feet away. behind the set into the background to make it look like the jungle extended much further back, the brightness of the background compared to the foreground gave it a fairy tale effect that emphasized the bewildering adventure that Cooper and Stack loved about each other. meters in front of the set.

It was a giant sheet of glass that was painted with dark shadows of trees and just a few feet in front of the glass was the camera. All of this gave the illusion of a deep, vast jungle in some shots, like planes falling from the Empire State Building. When building, they would expose part of a frame of film and then run the same roll of film through the camera with an image of the opposite side exposed, this gave the appearance of overlay. Another simple technique included the Dunning process where blue and yellow lighting was filtered. over the background and foreground in black and white to make the background appear transparent, then two strips of film were loaded into the camera at the same time so that the film was placed on top of a stop-motion scene, placing the live action characters in one stop. -Moving scene, of course, this is a very risky technique.

If any of these techniques fail, this means that the entire film role is ruined and everything has to be redone to perhaps solve this problem. A man named Lynn Dunn approached RKA Studios with the Williams Process which uses an optical printer, a projector and a camera, all played in sync so that everything is combined into one image on film. This technique was first used primarily in King Kong as a way for Lin Dunn to demonstrate the effectiveness of it. It ended up being a success as it avoided the risk of losing entire film rules; both Dunning's and Williams' processes were basically just green projection techniques before they had the right technology for it.

An important technique was used which was quite easier by using a rear screen projector after the stop-motion scene was made accordingly the finished product would be projected on a translucent screen from behind in front of the projector would be the actors This way, the actors could react directly to exactly what is seen in front of them. was used in the scene where the film crew throws a grenade at the stegosaurus, they were able to time the throw perfectly and then watch the effects in front of them. Another includes the scene where Dara watched Kong and the T-rex fight from the tree.

Because this included his reaction, the rear projector technique was perfect to help make the scene seem as genuine as possible. I also used a projector technique which was a miniature projection on the stop-motion sets, basically a small projection screen was built on the stop-motion set and the live action actors were projected from behind just like the giant overhead projector technique because stop motion consisted of images. Every frame of the live action film was projected on the mini projector that way, when they were played, both the live action and stop motion were happening smoothly and naturally in the same shot and Kong could interact with the projection. .

There was also a fan present to prevent the TV from overheating due to the heat from the projector. If they wanted Kong to walk behind the projection, the projector was turned to the side and a mirror. It was positioned diagonally to project the same image onto the projector from behind, this allowed Kong to position himself behind the projection on set without getting in the way of the projection itself and creating a shadow. These projection techniques became extremely complex, like the scene. where Anne Darrow and the other man are two separate projections in the same shot, these types of techniques were used and mixed throughout the film to give variety, which only emphasized the skill of the practical effects, a figure was used of Anne from three to four inches for the scenes where Kong was holding her, however, when he placed her on the ground, as in this well-known scene, you can see his hand pass in front of the projection as the figure disappears and becomes in live action actress.

Another impressive scene was when Kong was holding Anne and starts playing with her clothes first they filmed Anne sitting on the giant gorilla's hand then in production for the stop motion they projected the images of Anne and the hand behind the stop-motion figure Kong's arm looked like this. was behind him looking extremely natural when he removes the clothing from Anne, they cut to Kong holding a piece of cloth and used wire to tear off the clothing in the live action footage or when Kong looks out the window, they use the technique of rear projection. then he moves the giant robotic hand through the side window, all in one go, on top of all these complicated techniques.

O'Brien's ability to bring Kong to life may be one of the most memorable parts of the film for audiences. Willis O'Brien understood that while Kong was a monster that terrorized the city, he was still a gorilla with ape instincts, like the incredibly intense and surprising Kong vs T-Rex scene that took seven weeks to make. After Kong kills the T-Rex, he begins to playfully move around the city. jaw, this was the innocence that O'Brien created in Kong, helping the audience realize that he is actually just an animal. Another cute scene was when the snake started approaching Anne, who we can see is a mini projection.

Kong is taking the time to pick a flower. and admires it, then when he hears a noise behind him, he immediately draws attention and goes to protect. Anne O'Brien knew exactly what she was doing and introduced a completely new liar to Kong's character even though he was literally just a stop-gap. The moving figures audience can empathize with being taken out of his house. She begins to despise the film crew who use Kong for his and Fortune's own benefit by selfishly and wantonly removing him from their environment and bringing him into a situation where people are flashing their cameras at him.

For him, the film looks more into the morality of showing animals for profit, as well as the deeper parts of Kong's character, such as his love for Anne at the end and in Kong's final moment, the music stops for a moment. and you realize that you see it. Less like a monster and more like a loving animal who wants love and affection and was taken from his home and punished for acting like the animal he is, his dramatic fall to his death may serve more as a lesson and may make the audience cry. because of the deep connection they had learned to develop with Kong during the movie oh no, it wasn't the planes, it was Beauty Kills Beasts Willis O'Brien's techniques for King Kong were so innovative that they earned him a patent for his persistence and skill together Cooper and showed sex, a brilliant story and creativity ended up being one of the most incredible and notable films in history, especially for its time, careful detail, advanced technique and passion put into King's creation Kong make it unique even today. this movie is that even though it was made in 1933, audiences can still watch it in complete awe and

wonder

how the heck this movie was made today, where CGI is used to make movies easier, movies can lose the awe and creativity we see in KingKong.

If there is any film that shows and takes full advantage of the many possibilities of cinema without the intense technology we see today, it would be this film. King Kong 1933 truly has heart and soul and will continue to surprise and inspire special effects artists and audiences. Until the end of time, no one will be able to forget the iconic image of Kong on top of the Empire State Building, it symbolized the current capital civilization, morality, love and also the power of cinema when it is in the right hands.