This Enthralling Documentary Explores the Making of the Film, “The Revenant”

Immersing an audience into a story and its location is an important part of a cinematic production, and in this 45-minute long behind-the-scenes documentary on the making of “The Revenant,” both cast and crew provide insight into the huge undertaking of producing this story in such a way that it would successfully immerse the viewers.

Behind-the-Scenes on the Visual FX Used in the Red Giant Short Film ‘Go Bag’

The filmmaking team at Red Giant have been creating great short films for the last few years, all of which have sort of served as a proving ground for the software, plug-ins, and visual effects tools that they sell. Their latest film falls right in line, and the behind the scenes content shows just how much planning during the shoot, and work in post had to be done.

Creating the Original Star Wars Lightsaber Effect, In-Camera

In 1977, quality video effects were expensive and time consuming to have, and more often than not a film relied upon in-camera effects and visual trickery to create their movie magic. One of cinema’s most well known space weapons utilized such a trick when it first debuted on film, and Shanks FX recreated this process in a really fun behind-the-scenes tutorial.

Behind the Scenes Video Illustrates How Time Consuming Stop Motion Can Be

I have never attempted stop motion, but I do appreciate a great stop motion film. One of the reasons I have never attempted it is because I’m deathly afraid of how long it would take and how much patience it would require. Well, after watching this video, which splices a final commercial with behind the scenes footage, I’m more convinced that the medium just isn’t for me.

Mashup of Movie Trailers From 2015 is a Visual Feast of Cinematic Visuals

Sit back, relax, and take in the entire six-minute edit of movie trailers from 2015, masterfully cut together by Louis Plamondon, AKA YouTube user Sleepy Skunk.

Peter Jackson & Crew Admit They Were Basically Winging the Production of “The Hobbit”

Though it is still surprising to hear coming from the mouths of the production team, it does certainly explain why The Hobbit series are considered to be much lesser films than the original Lord of the Rings trilogy. In this video, Peter Jackson and his crew spend about six and a half minutes venting (it really sounds like they didn’t initially intend to talk about this, but it all bubbled to the surface) about the insane schedule they were following during production, and how they started a poor chain of events that led to them only being ready to shoot a scene the morning that scene was supposed to be shot. This is in stark contrast to the original trilogy where the teams had a year to three years of previs and planning in place before a camera was ever rolled out on set.

Behind the Scenes of SPECTRE – Capturing The Largest Stunt Explosion Ever Created for a Film

In typical action-blockbuster form, the latest James Bond film is doing things on a bigger scale than has ever been done before. Namely, explosions. The crew is actually aiming to rig and execute a shot with the largest staged explosion for cinema ever, which would get them into the Guinness Book of World Records. The explosion reportedly used 8,418 liters of fuel and 33kg of explosives.

The Art of the “Dissolve,” the Most Often Used Transition in Film and Video

Transitions are everything in storytelling. Moving from one shot to the next can completely affect the way a scene flows, how a joke is received, and the timing of an edit add an incredible amount of impact. A major player in this segue from one image to another are transitions, the most common of which is a “dissolve.” This video explores and breaks down some notable, historical examples of this transition, and beautifully articulates the value in using them.

Behind the Scenes of “Turning Point” & its Successful Implementation of the One-Take Film Concept

There are some truly amazing examples of how to make a great film, and Joe Penna and his writing partner Ryan Morrison (of MysteryGuitarMan) are absolutely killing it with his latest short film “Turning Point,” which is a gut wrenching short that follows a woman infected with a deadly disease who must survive a night alone. The inspiration of the shoot came from the cinematography in “Birdman” which uses the “one shot” look (even though neither this nor Birdman was actually shot in one take). Joe and Ryan just released their behind the scenes video and gave us some great stills from their set while he explained a few things about how and why they chose to shoot this like they did.

Why Props Matter: A Spectacular Video Essay

I don’t really have any words to add to this. Just watch. Rishi Kaneria does an absolutely fantastic job explaining the importance of a great prop, and how items in films can become as iconic, or even more so, than the people in them.