# Every Best Visual Effect Winners ... Ever



## Daf57 (Mar 2, 2016)

This is very interesting!


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## Edika (Mar 2, 2016)

Some usual suspects but I thought the first Terminator had also won an Oscar for VFX.


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## Rosal76 (Mar 2, 2016)

Edika said:


> Some usual suspects but I thought the first Terminator had also won an Oscar for VFX.



At least Terminator 2 was in there. As much as I love the first Terminator more than it's sequel, I have to give the nod to T2 for it's effects.

I actually thought "The Thing (1982) would be in there.


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## MFB (Mar 2, 2016)

Terminator 2 was a huge leap for VFX at the time, doing liquid sim morphing both in shape and texturing - in what, 1995? That's right around the same time that Jurassic Park and Toy Story were showing what computers were capable of.


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## HeHasTheJazzHands (Mar 2, 2016)

1991 actually.


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## Random3 (Mar 2, 2016)

It was 1991. It was the first film to feature a fully CGI primary character that was integral to the plot. All prior CGI (Young Sherlock Holmes, The Abyss) were only featured in short scenes.

Interestingly T2 was the only sequel to win an Oscar when the original was not nominated for any. And it won 4.

This is actually no longer the case as now Mad Max also fits that criteria.


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## Emperor Guillotine (Mar 3, 2016)

Random3 said:


> This is actually no longer the case as now Mad Max also fits that criteria.


And _Ex Machina_ beat out _Mad Max_ for Best Visual Effects this year at the Oscars.  Well deserved.


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## wankerness (Mar 3, 2016)

Mad Max had better effects, as did Star Wars, but considering budgets, Ex Machina definitely deserved it. My guess is that adjusted for inflation, that was the lowest budget movie to ever win best visual effects. I think that was the most surprising win of the night, besides maybe Supporting Actor. Good for them for going for the "indie" choice.


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## MFB (Mar 3, 2016)

Emperor Guillotine said:


> And _Ex Machina_ beat out _Mad Max_ for Best Visual Effects this year at the Oscars.  Well deserved.



VFX pertains to the 3D element of it, which MM tried to do as little as possible of in favor of practical effects. Did they have some? Yes, a majority of which was color correction and plating, but that's minor compared to what Ex Machine did.


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## wankerness (Mar 3, 2016)

MFB said:


> *VFX pertains to the 3D element of it,* which MM tried to do as little as possible of in favor of practical effects. Did they have some? Yes, a majority of which was color correction and plating, but that's minor compared to what Ex Machine did.



?????


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## MFB (Mar 4, 2016)

wankerness said:


> ?????



Traditionally, any time I see noms for Visual FX, it's been for computer generated "wizardry" as the public might call it; and I even studied it in school - swapping out objects to simulate damage, smoke/wind/rain/fire/etc..., characters morphing, creating dinosaurs from nothing, and what have you. 

Are make-up and that stuff also a part of it? Yes, but at the Oscars, MM:FR took home a separate award (awardS even) for that: production design, and hair and make-up, because it boils down to tangible materials being used vs. computer generated.


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## wankerness (Mar 4, 2016)

MFB said:


> Traditionally, any time I see noms for Visual FX, it's been for computer generated "wizardry" as the public might call it; and I even studied it in school - swapping out objects to simulate damage, smoke/wind/rain/fire/etc..., characters morphing, creating dinosaurs from nothing, and what have you.
> 
> Are make-up and that stuff also a part of it? Yes, but at the Oscars, MM:FR took home a separate award (awardS even) for that: production design, and hair and make-up, because it boils down to tangible materials being used vs. computer generated.



Considering that video starts from 1927.... Something more along the lines of "usually CGI wins the day" might have been accurate, but "visuals effects means CGI" seems disingenuous. Many of the winners over the last 20 years were not the CGI heavy option of the bunch. The LOTR movies had a HUGE emphasis on practical effects (unlike the crummy Hobbit movies), and Gladiator, Inception, Independence Day, and Titanic all trounced their much more cgi-heavy competition. This year we also had Star Wars, which I believe was the heavy favorite to win, and that had plenty of practical stuff.

There are several flicks on there that clearly won more for innovation than for CGI pyrotechnics, too. Ex, Benjamin Button's intense aging CGI work, and the tiger work with Life of Pi. Both still CGI, but yeah.

Looking at the list of nominees, the one that really stands out as wtf is The Golden Compass over Transformers. Transformers is awful, but The Golden Compass?! CMON!


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## MFB (Mar 4, 2016)

I should clarify then, since that was more in regards to the instance of Ex Machina beating Fury Road. I would've felt that one was unjustly given out if it did indeed go to MM, which was only swindled out of one award (best picture, in my opinion). Sure they're both movies using CG, but one was using it in a more upfront and recognizable manner.

As a whole, the category is slowly changing which is what the previous two posts were more about; since as you said, past winners haven't had heavy focus on 3d but now we've got production/costume/hair and makeup awards along side that which seems to split the two up going forward.


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## wankerness (Mar 5, 2016)

Makeup effects has been an effects category some years since its first appearance with American Werewolf in London, but costuming usually just goes to the period drama with the foofiest dresses. I was very surprised Mad Max won.

The award Mad Max actually got swindled out of was Best Director, that was richly deserved. Best picture was more understandable.


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## flint757 (Mar 5, 2016)

I just watched Werewolf in London yesterday evening again and it holds up so well. I was watching the behind the scenes on the transformation and the city chase scenes; the ingenuity and patience it took to get those shots would be unheard of today. We still do some really solid ingenuity with animatronics and makeup now and then, but they spent several days in a row setting up that scene and doing the makeup every single day over and over to piece together that transformation. It still blows my mind when I watch it. They did it on a shoestring budget by today's standard as well, with only 11 million on the whole film; which roughly translates to about 30 million today.


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## wankerness (Mar 5, 2016)

Yeah, my favorite effects movies are those wildly innovative early 80s ones. The Thing, The Fly, Videodrome, Cat People, American Werewolf, etc. They might not look as "realistic" as today's effects, but there's an artistic aspect to them that is lost in the modern effects movies that have gigantic teams of animators working on them. The behind the scenes docs on them are also extremely entertaining, while modern flicks tend to have INCREDIBLY boring ones. "This is the room of 500 animators who all had to program the fake Captain America on his fake motorcycle, here's the 500 guys who animated the giant things crashing into the city, here's the 2000 guys that animated the robots punching each other, etc." In the 80s it was like "this day, the bucket of guts was left out in the heat, so when we had this guy stuck through the floor with the fake upper torso with all the guts hanging out sitting there, it was all he could do to keep from puking!" or "we realized we didn't have a shot of the terminator's eye going out, so we whipped up this contraption with a single electric light and some tinfoil and a smoke machine to get that shot," etc. All the stories of effects going wrong and the final product having to be improvised were awesome, and unfortunately that era is pretty much lost.


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## Rosal76 (Mar 9, 2016)

wankerness said:


> In the 80s it was like "this day, the bucket of guts was left out in the heat, so when we had this guy stuck through the floor with the fake upper torso with all the guts hanging out sitting there, it was all he could do to keep from puking!"



Describes the best special effect in Day of the dead (1985). 



wankerness said:


> Yeah, my favorite effects movies are those wildly innovative early 80s ones. The Thing, The Fly, Videodrome, Cat People, American Werewolf, etc.



Fails to mention Day in the first sentence. 

I'm just messing with ya, Wankerness.  Props for remembering the awesome effects work Tom Savini and crew did on "Day of the dead".


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## wankerness (Mar 9, 2016)

Yeah, Day of the Dead has some of the best gore effects of all time, unlike some other kinds of effects they really don't date. About the only effect in there that doesn't hold up is Dr. Tongue at the beginning, but it's such a startling effect it's still pretty awesome. It's weird how lousy Walking Dead's are in comparison, though that show often uses CGI "enhancements" which make them look worse. 

Videodrome had a similar story to that one, where the guts used in the exploding TV all went bad before filming!


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