Have you ever wondered just how much technology played a role in your favorite movies and TV shows? There isn't much that these VFX wizards can’t do...

Avengers: Endgame

It's a no-brainer that the highest-grossing film of all time had an incredible CGI budget. The main reason why Avengers: Endgame relied on CGI more heavily than other Marvel movies was due to time constraints. By the time principal photography began, many of the characters' signature costumes were incomplete, meaning that they had to be finished digitally in post-production.

"Because they filmed everything back-to-back with Infinity War, it was shot quite a long time ago and at that point, they didn't really know what they would be wearing," said visual effects supervisor Stuart Penn. "It was pretty much... they just shot it and then decided later on, much later on, what they were going to be wearing. It wasn't until quite a way into post that the actual design was formalized."

Star Wars

CGI did not exist at the time that George Lucas's Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back was in production. Industrial Light & Magic (ILM)—the same company that brought The Irishman to life decades later—invented a new animation technique, using detailed miniature models filmed at close range rather than building props on a life-sized scale.

The Empire Strikes Back is credited with paving the pay for the future of CGI. VFX supervisor John Dykstra pioneered a computer-manipulated motion camera system, fittingly called the "Dykstraflex". The Dykstraflex created the illusion of motion by filming a spaceship model against a blue screen while the camera circled around it.

Avatar

James Cameron had been drafting Avatar since the 1990s, but the director had to wait for technological advancements that could bring his vision to life. The cast acted out their scenes wearing full-body motion-capture suits on a performance capture stage six times larger than anything Hollywood had ever seen. A whopping 900 people were employed by Weta Digital to work on the movie.

Microsoft was forced to build a brand new system specifically for the purpose of storing massive amounts of data for Avatar. Each minute of final footage for the nearly three-hour-long film occupied 17.28 gigabytes of storage. It took several hours to render each individual frame of the film.

Jurassic Park

Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park is actually known for its lack of CGI. The team behind one of history's most iconic films pulled it off by mixing digital imagery with real-life animatronics. You might be surprised to learn that only 15 or so minutes of the dinosaur scenes were computer-generated. The rest used SFX master Stan Winston's physical dinosaur models.

Spielberg had always intended to keep the CGI in Jurassic Park to a minimum. While the advancements of CGI were far more limited back in 1993 when compared to modern times, Jurassic Park revolutionized the use of moderate CGI. The film was awarded a well-earned Academy Award for Best Visual Effects in 1994.

Interstellar

Whether you believe it or not, Christopher Nolan's Interstellar didn't use a single green screen. Nolan shot the entire film on a single handheld IMAX camera. Although Interstellar is a space epic, the film steered away from CGI in favor of detailed physical sets. Instead, the crew projected space onto 60-foot-tall backdrops in order for the actors to engage more authentically with the world Nolan had built around them.

To create a scientifically accurate black hole, Interstellar's VFX team wrote a rendering of software based on the equations of an actual astrophysicist. Some of the individual frames took up to 100 hours to render. "Chris really wanted us to sell the idea that the black hole is spherical," said Paul Franklin, the film's visual effects supervisor. The film won an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.

The Irishman

Martin Scorcese's The Irishman wasn't the first movie to age actors in reverse using CGI, but it was easily the most successful. The $140-million Netflix production experimented with a combination of groundbreaking AI software, motion-capture technology, and an experimental three-camera rigging system. These groundbreaking advancements in technology have paved the way for a new type of filmmaking.

Before production on the film began, the VFX team spent two years indexing a digital library of images and sequences from the filmographies of Joe Pesci, Al Pacino, and Robert De Niro. The design of each character was tailored for the movie. "Like any achievement, it’ll be measured against what it will do for the industry in the future," said VFX supervisor Pablo Helman.

Inception

Inception bent the minds of audiences everywhere, and not just because of the intricate plot, which delighted (and confused) audiences everywhere. "Some of the more spectacular imagery of the film—the street folding over in Paris, characters creating architecture out of thin air—are VFX shots that we created from a combination of live-action and copious amounts of digital animation," said VFX supervisor Paul Franklin.

Although much of Franklin's work on the film involved CGI, the VFX team built a miniature version of the mountain fortress set. "The great thing about miniatures is they give you this chaotic reality that digital hasn't quite gotten to yet," he said. Franklin also used CGI to "subtly bend elements like physics, space, and time."

Gone Girl

David Fincher's Gone Girl may not seem like a film that required any visual effects at all, but that only because Fincher's use of CGI is imperceptible to the untrained eye. Fincher is notably a fan of CGI. Artemple Hollywood, the VFX studio behind the film, released a reel showcasing the digital augmentations made to each of the scenes.

Nick and Amy Dunne's muted, lifeless home is lit so perfectly that it's hard to believe it was shot on a sound stage. However, the breakdown reel shows that everything beyond the walls of the house was a green screen. Shooting on a sound stage allowed Fincher the flexibility to shoot without being concerned with natural lighting.

Cats

Everyone knows that Tom Hooper's nightmarish live-action Cats wasn't exactly well-received. A violent response from audiences and critics alike to the Cats trailer forced the visual effects team to redo all of their CGI immediately after its release. Hooper was working on the film right up until the day before its world premiere. Fortunately, the film's "digital fur technology" may revolutionize the portrayal of CGI animals in the future.

On its opening day, Universal notified theaters that they would be receiving an updated version of the film with "some improved visual effects" within the next few days.

"This isn't a joke: Cats was rushed into theaters before being finished so a new version is being sent to theaters with updated effects," wrote Variety features editor Jenelle Riley. "How do you know if you have the old version? Look for Judi Dench's human hand, wedding ring and all."

Blade Runner 2049

Jack Nelson was responsible for the CGI that brought Rachael to life in the Academy Award-winning sequel to 1982's Blade Runner, Blade Runner 2049. Great measures were taken to ensure that the process, which took over a year to complete, was developed in total secrecy.

Rachael was given the code name "Rita" during filming in order to avoid letting anyone in on the project. Nelson and his team first created a digital replica of Young's skull. Actress Loren Peta was then brought in as Rachael's body double. It took a number of attempts, but by the end, both Nelson and director Denis Villeneuve were thrilled with the final result.

Iron Man

If you compare the first time Iron Man appears on screen versus in films like Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: End Game, it becomes obvious that animation technology has advanced considerably since his debut. In the original Iron Man film, the production relied heavily on CGI—the 90-pound Mark 1 suit was too unwieldy for both Robert Downey Jr. and his stunt double.

The Great Gatsby

Nearly every scene in Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby involves some sort of CGI. Even the famous Gatsby mansion was entirely computer-generated. Critics applauded the film's visual effects but were ultimately unimpressed by its lack of heart.

Guardians of the Galaxy

Bradley Cooper may have voiced Rocket Raccoon in Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, but the man in the green unitard was none other than director James Gunn's brother, Sean Gunn. "Sean is able to physically do something most actors aren't able to do, which is waddle around on all fours," said James. "He's always been an incredibly limber guy that can do a lot of strange physical things. And the fact that he's able to waddle around on his legs all day long at the exact height of Rocket is quite a feat and quite, quite difficult."

Space Jam

1996's Space Jam was one of the first films to ever use digital technology like CGI. The live-action/animation hybrid was shot in a virtual studio; Michael Jordan filmed in a 360-degree green screen room with motion trackers, acting opposite green-suited NBA players and improv artists against a green screen.

The Twilight Saga: Eclipse

In order to portray werewolf Jacob in The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, Taylor Lautner was forced to wear a "non-reflective grey outfit" while acting opposite co-star Kristen Stewart. According to the VFX team, this was done in order to "get the right kind of eye lines and motivation." Neither Stewart nor Lautner was thrilled about the arrangement.

The Chronicles of Narnia

Cutting-edge CGI brought Aslan, the magical talking lion in The Chronicles of Narnia franchise, to life. At first, the actors worked with a bust of Aslan's head while filming scenes opposite the jungle cat, but soon production realized that it wasn't working. Although the film was released over 15 years ago, the CGI is still shockingly good.

The Avengers

When Mark Ruffalo was first approached about playing the Hulk in The Avengers, he was hesitant to accept the role. Ruffalo has called the process of evolving into his character "humiliating" due to his "man-canceling suit," saying that the tight leotard "makes you look big where you want to look small and small where you want to look big."

Jurassic World

2015's Jurassic Park sequel, Jurassic World, used a tremendous amount of CGI in comparison to its predecessor due to budgetary constraints. Director Colin Trevorrow later admitted he would have preferred animatronics over CGI, especially considering their role in the success of Jurassic Park, but $150 million could only take the blockbuster so far.

Sin City

The Sin City franchise is famous for its use of CGI, which brought the comic book movie to life in highly artistic a way that had never been done before.

"People have accused me of realism in the past. Not guilty as charged. My stuff is very stylized," said Frank Miller, author of the Sin City comics. "Robert [Rodriguez] was able to show me how real actors could perform within the universe that I drew and then to amplify that further. Technology has improved [that] dramatically over the last 10 years."

Life of Pi

Nearly all of the scenes in Life of Pi that featured Richard Parker, the tiger who served as Piscine Molitor's only companion, were created with CGI. The director decided to reserve real tigers for single shots only. "By doing that, it set our bar high for CGI. We couldn’t cheat at all," said visual effects supervisor Bill Westernofer. "It pushed the artists to go and deliver something that’s never been done before, something as photo-real as anyone has ever done with an animal."

Captain Marvel

When fans of Captain Marvel found out that Brie Larson's blonde locks were actually CGI, they were shaken to their core. One visual effects studio that worked on the movie was tasked with the sole responsibility of de-aging Samuel Jackson by 25 years. The final version of the film includes 385 VFX shots.

The Lord of the Rings

Eric Saindon, the visual effects supervisor in The Lord of the Rings, struggled to create Gollum, seeing as the motion-capture suit was not yet a common technology in 2001. "When we did Gollum, no one had really done a CG creature mixed with live-action that you were supposed to believe was just a creature in the scene," he said. Saindon's VFX team invented the technology that brought Gollum to life, and they won an Oscar for the monumental feat.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Rise of the Planet of the Apes wouldn't have been such a success if it wasn't for the film's incredible digital effects. Andy Serkis donned a motion-capture suit to play Caesar, the hyper-intelligent chimp who leads a revolt against the shelter's abusive staff. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.

Avengers: Infinity War

Avengers: Infinity War transformed an 8,000-acre farm in Chattahoochee Hills, Georgia into the fields of Wakanda. Trees that were indigenous to Africa were added to the terrain, as well as a makeshift river. Although it appeared as though thousands were fighting on the battlefield, there were only about 70 actors and stunt performers—CGI added 500 digital people and about 10,000 beasts.

Deadpool

Deadpool used far more CGI than audiences may have realized. In fact, Ryan Reynolds' mask had no eyepieces in real life. The VFX team went in afterward and animated Deadpool's white eyes to align with Reynold's expression beneath the mask.

Game of Thrones

Game of Thrones was one of the most famous shows in history, which was in part due to the scale of their visual effects. The CGI became more sophisticated with each passing season, especially when it came to Daenerys' dragon. Subreddits devoted to the show joked that every time a direwolf was killed off, it had been sacrificed to the "Gods of the CGI budget," implying that the SFX required to animate them was too expensive.

The Matrix

In the 1990s, CGI was an emerging technology, and The Matrix utilized it in a way that was far more involved than anything audiences had seen before. The film combined traditional props and effects with what was then considered state-of-the-art digital technology. It is best known for popularizing a visual effect known as "bullet time," which allows a shot to progress in slow-motion while the camera moves through the scene at what appears to be real-time speed.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest increased the bar for visual effects. Each shot of Bill Nighy as Dave Jones involved months of work, noodling every movement and expression to perfection. CGI veteran Hal Hickel, who worked on the original Toy Story, led the animation team—and needless to say, they went above and beyod.

Beauty And The Beast

Throughout the filming of Beauty and the Beast, Dan Stevens was wearing an enormous gray motion-capture suit. Not only that, but he had to walk with spring lifts on his feet for extra height. "It's an ordeal for my calf muscles alone," the actor said. Fortunately, Stevens was able to forego a camera rig in order to help the scenes opposite Emma Watson feel more natural.

The Hunger Games

Although the hologram and desktops manipulated by the Control Room operators in The Hunger Games looked like real technology, it was all a CGI illusion. "There was tremendous pressure on us that we were constantly looking for creative ways to make up for the lack of time and money," said Sheena Duggal, the film's VFX supervisor. The Hunger Games contains 1,200 VFX shots, all of which were completed in a matter of weeks. 

Avengers: Infinity War

Did you know that 96% of Avengers: Infinity War involved some sort of CGI? About 2,900 of the final 3,000 shots used visual effects, which made sense, seeing as Josh Brolin's Thanos was entirely CGI. Most of the characters received digital costume enhancements, including Bucky Barnes, whose robot arm was actually just a green arm sleeve.

The Walking Dead

This epic scene in the seventh season finale of The Walking Dead is much funnier once you realize that Shiva the tiger is actually just a guy in a blue unitard. 6'3", 240-pound stuntman Scott Hunter leaped off a mini trampoline in order to take down one of Negan's Saviors.

Gravity

Gravity was four years in the making before it hit theaters—technology had to catch up to the film's vision. Sandra Bullock's costume was attached to wires, and a team manipulated the Oscar-winning actress like a marionette. The VFX was a monumental job, with every single scene requiring some amount of CGI.

Kill Bill

Uma Thurman was essentially a human puppet during the making of Kill Bill. However, it recently came to light that director Quentin Tarantino pressured Thurman into operating an unsafe vehicle for a pivotal scene without CGI or a green screen. Although production knew the car should have been driven by a stunt professional, Thurman relented, crashed the car, and injured herself profusely.

Into the Woods

Rob Marshall directed the silver screen adaptation of this Sondheim fantasy musical. While Into the Woods required a fair amount of CGI, Matt Johnson, the visual effects supervisor, wanted to keep things as "old-school" as possible, only adding digital enhancements and backdrops where necessary. "[Marshall] wanted everything to feel more organic, to feel more natural, and yeah, it's a darker sort of fairy tale," Johnson said. "It's more to the tune of the Brothers Grim rather than, I don't know, Walt Disney."

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

The Harry Potter film franchise revolutionized special effects. The Quidditch scenes in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the sixth installment of the series, were done so well that it was hard to tell what was CGI... well, minus the flying, of course.

Cloverfield

Cloverfield's viral marketing campaign helped make it a found-footage staple, but it wouldn't have had the same impact without the head of the Statue of Liberty screeching down a New York City street. In the final film, the scene was reworked to give Lady Liberty's noggin some more detail. "We reworked the shot, rebuilt the head, changed a lot of things about it, made it much more dynamic, and we also knew that [director] Matt [Reeves] wanted to focus on the head for quite a long time," said Michael Ellis, one of the film's visual effects supervisors.

Boardwalk Empire

The best CGI is so realistic that audiences can't tell that it's there. Some of the best television—such as this scene in Boardwalk Empire—has been cobbled together from a green screen and an incredible VFX team. The team in question here was Brainstorm Digital, who called the show their "most complex job to date," in which they had to "treat it like a feature film."

Paranoia

Although the film doesn't offer many large-scale special effects, Paranoia featured a scene outside of Geno's Steaks, a popular Philadelphia tourist trap. Rather than shooting on location, the visual effects team stepped in and built a virtual set instead.

Oz the Great and Powerful

Although Oz the Great and Powerful was panned by critics, its stunning CGI stands out as a magnificent feat in the realm of visual effects. With an impressive budget of $200 million, the CGI in Oz the Great and Powerful was a focal point of the movie, for better or for worse.

300

Over 1,500 visual effects were laid over bluescreens in the epic period action movie 300. Lena Headey found it bizarre to work on a set with so few props. "It's very odd, and emotionally, there's nothing to connect to apart from another actor." Only one scene in the whole film, where horses rode across a plain, was shot outdoors.

Wolf of Wall Street

The visual effects in Martin Scorcese's Oscar-winning hit The Wolf of Wall Street were so discreet that you may not have realized the actors were even on a sound stage. The final shot featured above is almost entirely a digital composite. There's always more than what meets the eye!

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

The movie magic of the Harry Potter film series required plenty of movie (and wizarding) magic. In this scene from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the books "summoned" by Hermione in the Hogwarts library were actually being handed to her by crew members whose hands were digitally rendered out later.

The Martian

As far as space movies go, The Martian required less CGI than Gravity, but an unbelievable amount of detail went into the film's VFX. Wadi Rum, a desert in Jordan, served as the backdrop of Mars. Every shot showcasing the rocky terrain was rendered digitally.

Robocop

Surprisingly, the RoboCop suit itself was not CGI—however, knowing it would have been more difficult to build hundreds of 208 robots, most of the foot soldiers were CGI for the sake of cost and effort. "CGI is advancing every year in terms of getting realism for an affordable price," said Martin Whist, Robocop's production designer. "That’s always been the goal, more realism. And money is always the limiter."

The Dark Knight

Once Gotham's "white knight," District Attorney Harvey Dent's gritty transformation into Two-Face 2008's The Dark Knight was some serious wizardry. "This character was one of our major VFX challenges," said Nick Davis, the film's Visual Effects Supervisor. "Chris [Nolan] was not interested in going the traditional make-up route. He felt that it would be an additive effect, rather than the subtractive effect that he felt the character required. So, instead of adding a layer of material to the actor's skin, we actually removed the skin digitally."

District 9

VFX studio Image Engine was responsible for the unearthly CGI in the gritty alien thriller District 9, but it wasn't an easy feat. One of the most difficult shots from the field was dubbed "the 1,000,000-alien shot," in which a brief shot depicted the interior of the alien mothership filled with hundreds of aliens. "That was hard mostly because we didn't have a lot of time to do it, so we had to scramble to figure out a way to get all the aliens together in that shot and make it work," said visual effects supervisor Dan Kaufman.

I Am Legend

Will Smith wasn't really fighting off zombie dogs in I Am Legend—instead, a man in a green suit was coming at him with a dog puppet. Smith shared this hilarious behind-the-scenes look at the 2007 film on Instagram. "I was like, 'My dude, I can feel your little hush puppies on my thigh," Smith said of the scene. "You're going to need to settle down with your core thrusting."

Iron Man

Over time, Robert Downey Jr. was allowed to ditch the full Iron Man suit while filming. As it turns out, the Iron Man suit is "really, really uncomfortable and pinchy," according to animation director Marc Chu. In the later Iron Man movies, the man in the suit isn't actually RDJ. It is either a CGI rendering or a stuntman.

Avengers: Infinity War

Even though Thanos was one-hundred percent CGI, Josh Brolin's acting was able to be relayed on the screen down to the smallest details. A process called Masquerade scanned Brolin's face, studying the minutiae of his expressions. Kelly Port, the VFX supervisor, said that she was most proud of capturing the "subtleties of [Brolin's] performance."

Man of Steel

Man of Steel director Zack Snyder wanted to make the film look as natural as possible, which can be difficult when you're dealing with a superhuman premise. John Desjardin, the film's visual supervisor, stated that Snyder "wanted people to suspend their disbelief, and we the visual effects team had to make it as easy as possible for them to do so."

Mad Max: Fury Road

Despite the sheer insanity of the effects in Mad Max: Fury Road, the majority—including the crazy car stunts—were accomplished without any CGI at all. Only ten percent of the film used CGI. "This is a film that didn't defy the laws of physics," said director George Miller.

A Good Day to Die Hard

It goes without saying that A Good Day to Die Hard has been universally deemed the worst installment of the Die Hard franchise. Although it received horrendous reviews, audiences and critics both enjoyed the film's special effects. Director John Moore chose to pull off most of the stunts and explosions in real life, reserving VFX for backgrounds and minor enhancements.

Godzilla

Lead actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson claimed that 2014's Godzilla was shot mostly on-location with very little use of green screens. The VFX team studied animals like bears, lizards, lions, wolves, and Komodo dragons in order to create a lifelike reptilian monster. Most of the army vehicles, including tanks, were generated digitally.

Space Jam

The Hobbit

The Hobbit used far more CGI than The Lord of the Rings, which made Sir Ian McKellen much prefer his time in the latter series. "I was miserable," he said. "If Gandalf was on top of a mountain, I'd be there on the mountain. The technology was being invented while we were making the film. [In 'The Lord of the Rings'] I wasn't involved in any of that, I was away acting on a mountain. I tend not to remember the bad times, but I don't think there were any. I think I enjoyed every single moment of making those films."

Alice in Wonderland

Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland Academy earned a variety of Award nominations for its aesthetics. Visual effects supervisor Ken Ralston said that the film exhausted him, stating that it was "the biggest show I've ever done, [and] the most creatively involved I've ever been." He called his time on the set of Alice in Wonderland "a cool challenge to jump into something that big and with limited time."

Logan

James Mangold's Logan featured far more CGI than anyone may have known. The film shot action scenes using digital doubles; the VFX studio created CGI renderings of Hugh Jackman and Dafne Keen to overlay on top of trained stuntpeople.

The Maze Runner

The Maze Runner's VFX team found that using "golden hour" lighting helped to enhance the scale of the Maze environment. "In the movie, we have a lot of Maze, and of course we're very limited as to how much we can actually create," said production designer Marc Fisichella. The blue screen walls were built sixteen feet tall, but CGI extended them to one-hundred feet in post.

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword

Although King Arthur: Legend of the Sword bombed in theaters, its staggering VFX was deemed a "visual feast" by Indiewire. It took the visual effects team 18 months just to complete the film's complex opening sequence, but the biggest challenge by far was creating Excalibur, Pendragon's sword. "The sword was part of the evolving look," said Christian Kaestner, the visual effects supervisor. "It was something that was quite magical to begin with, then it became real and less interaction and less effects."

Tron: Legacy

The original 1982 version of Tron was the first major motion picture to use heavy CGI, and the 2010 sequel followed in its footsteps. It took two years and ten VFX studios to create the 1,565 visual effects shots in Tron: Legacy. Although the film was mediocrely received, the seamless VFX was praised—with the exception of Jeff Bridges' de-aging as Clu.