Hello again friends and olde timey matte and trick shot enthusiasts.  It's that time again for a trip through the cinematic museum of movie wizardry and creativity from the pre-computer era.  I call this my mid-winter blockbuster, as it is that particular season right now where I am, and what better time than to dust off a multitude of visual effects wonders to feast your eyes upon. Seriously.

Well, what have we got?  An overlooked disaster epic from long ago;  A CinemaScope lightweight medieval costumer; A pair of eighties flicks about teens with special abilities; A long forgotten football hero melodrama; Not one, but two (count 'em, 2) movies about salty old whale hunters; A tribute piece to matte artist Alan Maley; Some more dazzling and extremely rare Matthew Yuricich painted mattes that have never been seen before; Another example of fascinating Whitlock trickery; Some Abbott & Costello craziness; An All Time Hall-of-Fame Matte from 90 years ago, and more!!!

As usual, there are a couple of shows that may be fairly well known, but as is my pattern, a whole bunch of films and shots most will never have seen. I try my damndest to search, seek out and discover gems of movie magic from across the spectrum and range of genres.  There is truly nothing more satisfying than discovering forgotten or lost examples of this wonderful artform.

 Do try to view this extensive blog on a proper screen, and not some godammed phone or silly 'toy' device.  I will hunt you down and flog you if I discover anyone enjoying my blog on anything less than a 15" screen (minimum).   ;)

Well, here the journey begins.......

Enjoy

Peter

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***This vast and utterly exhaustive post, and all 184 previous blog posts known as 'Matte Shot', were originally created by Peter Cook for nzpetesmatteshot, with all content, layout and text originally published at http://nzpetesmatteshot.blogspot.com/ 

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NZ PETE'S HALL OF FAME MATTE SHOT - Part One

Anybody who doesn't recognise this mighty shot should excuse themselves and exit this blog with great haste and never look back!  Probably my all time favourite film, and best vfx film of all time - confirmed yet again by a repeat viewing a few days ago, for what must have been the 40th time?  KING KONG (1933) and the forboding Skull Island - made all the more forboding by Max Steiner's career best music score which goes along with my mantra, "the music maketh the matte".  This rare test frame shows a bit more on the sides of the frame than the final release prints, which is commonly the case with raw camera footage prior to dupe negs being struck.

The final shot from the release print, with Orville Goldner's wonderful stop motion birds doubled in.  The matte was painted either by Mario Larrinaga or Byron Crabbe.  *As an aside, both talented artists may be seen above on my 'blog header', working on a large dual plane glass of New York City for the same film.

One of the mystery paintings found in the collection of Matt Yuricich's family was this curious one.  It turned out to be a Jim Danforth matte of the Mexican locale that was rendered for the very depressing John Huston drama UNDER THE VOLCANO (1984), though the shot never made the final cut.  One or two other shots in the final film were painted by Al Whitlock.

A VINTAGE MYSTERY MATTE NOW SOLVED:

Earlier this year I published a whole package of mostly unidentified 35mm matte shot trims from the family of old time Paramount matte painter Jan Domela.  As I enjoy old movies I knew I'd come across some of these scenes sooner or later.  The recreation of romantic Venice was an extensive matte extension above the tank on the Paramount lot for THIS IS THE NIGHT (1932)

Domela's Venice, created without leaving the studio backlot.

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A PEEK BEHIND THE CURTAIN:  WHITLOCK'S ICEBERGS.

Some time ago one of my long time readers, Mark Wolf sent me a file of fascinating images that his friend Dave Boston had taken while on a sort of summer internship at Universal in Al Whitlock's department in 1974.  They were knee deep in THE HINDENBURG (1975) at the time, and Dave was able to observe the process (lucky, lucky Dave I say!!!)

Sadly, out of all of the rolls of Ektachrome colour transparenies, the majority had deteriorated over time (I can't recall whether it was water damage or what?  Oh, the humanity!), so only a handful remain usable.  Here we see Al busy at work on a pair of glasses in his matte studio for key shots in THE HINDENBURG.  Interestingly, at the time, the only actual daylight available for Albert was via that small high window, though I understand a few years later he had them build a full room level window with plenty of natural light.  The photo at left with the icebergs is elaborated upon below.  The other of the airship is most likely a photo cut-out, mounted on glass and hand retouched, which Whitlock resorted to for many of the different angles and perspective views of the craft as a time saver.

Al blocking in the mass with the aid of a rag and a clump of pigment.  According to Leigh Took, Leigh's mentor Cliff Culley used to often speak of Whitlock's 'rag-work' technique from the days when they painted together at Rank-Pinewood back in the early fifties in the UK.

The final shot where not only has Al matted in the icebergs 'drifting' under the airship, but he has also painted separately on another glass the mass of the zeppelin itself immediately surrounding the actors, one of whom is the excellent William Atherton... terrific actor, though I digress...

A rare squeezed anamorphic unfinished test frame from the collection of Larry Shuler.

A wider view, with dual paintings:  iceberg mass, and almost all of the actual airship rendered on separate glasses.  The passing cloud and mist is yet another element, often comprising of up to 3 'smoke' elements tri-packed through the matte camera for certain shots to lend a layered depth to the phenomenen.

Matted set extension of the actual fabric covered airship that nobody noticed.  One of 77 mattes created by Whitlock and Dutton for the Oscar winning film - and Al personally acknowleged each and every one of his team at the awards ceremony.

"...and they sailed off into the sunset and they all lived happily ever after?"

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THE MAN FROM COLORADO:  An exciting addition to my previous fx coverage

I did an article on the 1948 Columbia western, THE MAN FROM COLORADO, back in January this year, and as often happens, vital material comes to my attention after the fact, though is absolutely worthy of inclusion.  Here is an excellent before and after set of frames which radically alter the landscape of the gold mining town.

Columbia's resident photographic effects chief Lawrence Butler supervised, with long time matte cameraman Donald Glouner shooting the matte and composite.  It's quite likely Juan Larrinaga may have been the matte artist, and the work in this film is very good.

The final Technicolor scene.  A terrific movie in fact, with what I feel was Glenn Ford's best - and nastiest - performance.

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A TRIBUTE TO MATTE PAINTER ALAN MALEY:

"Alan Maley had worked with me on In Search of the Castaways, back in England.  I thought he was very talented, and in 1965 he came over from England to work with me at Disney Studios.  Alan was given a room across the hall from mine, and there he would spend his days honing his skills until he quickly became very good at matte painting.  His room - actually more like a den - soon became very cluttered.  He seemed happiest when he had made a kind of nest of reference books, paints, boxes and old magazines.  Over in the corner would be Alan, out of sight, hidden by a large easel, on which he would be matte painting".

                            Peter Ellenshaw:  ELLENSHAW UNDER GLASS

I always like to expand upon the careers of painters and technicians from the past, as often not enough has been forthcoming about so many unsung heroes of the special photographic effects arena.  One such gentleman would be British matte painter and fine artist, Alan Maley.  *note:  the above photo was a deliberate 'gag' snapshot taken while Alan was heading the ILM matte department in the early 80's.  Apparently Alan was always bemused by pics of matte artists with what he called "impossibly small brushes", and as one trained in the 'big brush style', posing here with a mammoth DRAGONSLAYER painting and a ridiculous pin-head fine brush just for a laugh.

Alan began his film career when a young man as a backing painter at Denham Studios, UK, in the early 1950's.  Like many backing and scenic artist boys did, Alan branched out into matte and glass shots, as did fellow British exponents such as Cliff Culley, Albert Whitlock, Peter Melrose and Les Bowie among many others. A considerable number of Alan's relatives were already in, or would soon be in, the British studio, largely in fields such as sign writing and scenic work.

Alan moved between various studios where the work was, with a few years in Wally Veevers' photographic effects unit at Shepperton with fellow well established artists such as George Samuels and Bob Cuff.  One noteworthy assignment that Alan proved his skills was the magnificent Peter O'Toole-Richard Burton historic drama BECKET (1964), where Alan provided several stunning mattes such as this beautiful and expansive vista of London during the era of King Henry II.  An almost full painting with just a tiny sliver of live action upper left as the horseman gallops away up the hill.  Smoke is also added to some chimney pots.

Another sprawling vista from BECKET which is shown here in this rare original full painting.  The final sequence was optically reduced and scanned down from the castle and across the valley.  A horse and rider would be optically added going down the hillside.  Note, the rising smoke was entirely painted 'as is'.

Maley cathedral set extension also from the excellent film BECKET (1964)

One of the most famous and iconic sequences of all time was the penultimate nuclear bomb drop on the USSR in Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece DR STRANGELOVE: OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB (1964).

The great Slim Pickens takes the ride of his life.  Alan painted a highly detailed massive 12 foot wide Soviet landscape with missile battery into which effects cameraman Peter Harman simulated a dramatic 'fall' and Wally Veevers added a blue screened bomb and actor to brilliant effect.

Alan also worked for a time for the opposition, Pinewood Studios, where he joined Cliff Culley's matte department, under the overall supervision of Peter Ellenshaw who came across from the States to oversee the enormous Disney visual effects showcase IN SEARCH OF THE CASTAWAYS (1962) - one of Disney's best matte shot films in my opinion, with composite work seemingly yards ahead of the comps being done back in California for some reason.  Beautiful mattes a-plenty, and all so well assembled.  Alan painted miniature backings and helped with the many mattes, as did Culley.

IN SEARCH OF THE CASTAWAYS matte.  I saw it as a kid and it completely 'had me' as far as old school adventure went.  Incidentally, I did a substantial effects blog a number of years back on this under-appreciated FX film, which can be found HERE

The IN SEARCH OF THE CASTAWAYS Pinewood matte dept jokesters all lined up as villains that only a mother could love, and made this set of mug-shots and prints etc for supervisor Peter Ellenshaw.  That's Alan at far right.  Cliff Culley is second from left and matte cameraman Martin Shorthall is next to Maley.

Accompanying the nasty row of 'mug shots' was this amusing CASTAWAYS certificate from the 'Department of Special Defects', and loaded with excuses, much to Ellenshaw's amusement.  *Thanks to my pal Harrison Ellenshaw for this little gem.

Recalling Alan's excellent work on CASTAWAYS, Ellenshaw a few years later secured Maley stateside for a permanent role in the Disney matte department when artist Jim Fetherolf left.  This Maley matte is from THE ONE AND ONLY, GENUINE, ORIGINAL, FAMILY BAND (1968).

A large number of mattes were needed for Disney's THE HAPPIEST MILLIONAIRE (1968).

Disney had some massive effects shows around that time, with the ever popular THE LOVE BUG (1969) requiring many mattes and other trick shots.  Alan was chief matte artist around this time and headed up the department.  Peter Ellenshaw still put some time in but was mainly doing production design.  Constantine 'Deno' Ganakes was also on board and had also been in the department for several years.

Alan's wide vista of San Francisco opens THE LOVE BUG.  A small model car was pulled along in an unpainted slot toward the house.  Not a shot anybody would expect to be a trick shot at all.

Among the multitude of mattes and gags in THE LOVE BUG, this dramatic closing shot was another invisible Maley matte.  The shot starts on a crowded park and pulls back over the city before dissolving into a second vast aerial matte of San Francisco.  Interesting story here:  I was asking Harrison Ellenshaw about this matte and he mentioned that the painting had mysteriously vanished from the Disney lot many years ago, and nobody knew whatever became of it......  See below!

... and hey-presto, there it is!  The surviving matte glass, decades after the fact, mounted on the wall of one of Alan's family members.  Note the fx camera slate beside it from the 007 film THE SPY WHO LOVED ME (1977), on which Alan was matte and optical artist (see more later...)

There were some beautifully atmospheric matte shots from Alan in another Disney picture, NEVER A DULL MOMENT (1968), with wonderfully rendered night time views of New York City.

Alan received an Academy Award for special visual effects - shared with Danny Lee and Eustace Lycette - for BEDKNOBS AND BROOMSTICKS (1971)

Here's one of Alan's original matte paintings still in pristine condition at Disney.

The BEDKNOBS matte art in the special storage area at Disney, along with scores of other carefully conserved paintings on glass.  I'd like to take a look through those some day.

Another delightful Oscar winning matte from BEDKNOBS AND BROOMSTICKS (1971).  By this time Alan would have an apprentice in the department by the name of Harrison (P.S) Ellenshaw.  Harrison told me how he learned everything from Alan, even though his own father was master matte artist, the celebrated Peter Ellenshaw.

Post Oscar celebration time 1971 as Peter toasts Alan on his Academy Award win.

A pair of Disney matte exponents in good cheer.

Among the numerous films that Alan painted on during those busy Disney years was the slapstick SNOWBALL EXPRESS (1972).

HERBIE RIDES AGAIN (1974) would be one of several clones of the original LOVE BUG, and like the former, required substantial matte work from Alan, assisted by a young P.S Ellenshaw - before he changed his name to 'Harrison' to avoid confusion with his father.  Harrison told me some great stories in my career piece I did with him: "Alan actually banned my father from coming into the matte department for a few months.  He was very protective of me and just didn't want my father to interfere.  We both laughed about it later on".

Exotic locales courtesy of Maley for THE WORLD'S GREATEST ATHLETE (1973).  Harrison told me more about Alan: "He was more than an artist, he was a superb technician, a great photographer and a film maker.  He not only taught me about painting, he taught me how to be a visual storyteller. He loved films and knew everything about films.  Alan pushed me to study reference photos and learn about architecture and nature - all sorts of things.  To Alan, if you are going to paint a street in London in the 17th Century, you'd better know all about the details of the architecture and why the buildings were built the way they were".

Probably the biggest VFX show Disney ever produced was the highly entertaining ISLAND AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD (1974).  A film with a staggering number of effects shots, from mattes to models to countless travelling matte composites.  This is one of Alan's mattes, whereby an extensive painting has a rear projected live action plate of the ground crew filmed at the Golden Oak Ranch with VistaVision equipment; a photo cut-out of the miniature airship - mounted on a separate sheet of glass and animated a frame at a time - and a light bulb burnt in to simulate the brilliance of the sunrise.

A partial photograph of Alan's painting.  I did a comprehensive blog piece on this film's visual effects years ago, with a lot of background info, lengthy and detailed interview and behind the scenes material courtesy of Harrison, and that article may be read right HERE.

Before and after ISLAND AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD, with painting combined with actors on a set through sodium process matting, which Disney used extensively.

One of Alan's iconic ISLAND shots, where his surprisingly loose brushwork and paint application is near impressionistic, yet worked. Harrison told me that he learned so much from watching Alan paint, who just made simple shots seem more magical.

A tremendous shot here, and probably my favourite Maley painting from the film.  Interestingly, ISLAND AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD was submitted to The Academy that year for best visual effects consideration, though the committee rejected it.  Actually, EARTHQUAKE won that year.

Another of the 93 painted mattes in ISLAND, with a soundstage set extension required here.  Alan was another advocate of the 'big brush' technique, as was Peter Ellenshaw.

..."Nobody does it better"

Alan left Disney in the mid seventies to pursue a career in fine art - especially art with a Victorian and Edwardian era theme - though he was coaxed back from film retirement by his cousin, Peter Lamont, who was art director under production designer Ken Adam on many James Bond pictures.  THE SPY WHO LOVED ME (1977) - one of the very best in my book (with O.H.M.S.S being a close runner up) - was a huge special effects project with Maley hired on by Eon Productions to furnish several spectacular mattes and split screen composites.  This view of The Kremlin in Moscow, I've always been of the opinion was a painted matte (though I stand to be corrected if anyone can confirm otherwise).

Alan is shown here at work on one of his SPY WHO LOVED ME Egypt trick shots.  For a shot of Bond approaching a night show of The Sphinx, Maley painted in the entire scene - even the audience - and matted in Roger Moore walking across the sand behind.

Maley's final composite as put together by effects cinematographer Robin Browne.  The painted crowd were brought to 'life' through the age old method of scraping away bits of paint from the glass and introducing a rotating device in back of the glass to give the illusion of 'movement'.  An ancient gag used as far back as the 1930's, especially by MGM.

Alan and the matte crew.  Incidentally, judging by the camera slate for SPY pictured earlier in this article, more than 20 mattes were made by Alan for this show, though I've only ever spotted half that number?

The big money shot in THE SPY WHO LOVED ME was this incredible pull back from a live action helicopter and crew, a tilt up, and a slow zoom in onto arch villain Stromberg on a railing!  All done as a continuous effects shot, though quite how, I don't know?  I understand Alan used front projection for some matte combinations, so maybe it was applied here?  Nice lens flare added too!  Great stuff.

Higher rez frame #1

Higher rez frame #2

Higher rez frame #3

Higher rez frame #4

Higher rez frame #5

Higher rez frame #6.  Following SPY WHO LOVED ME, Alan briefly was brought on board the next Bond film, MOONRAKER by his cousin, art director Peter Lamont, whereby Lamont took Alan, Derek Meddings and Robin Browne to NASA for a special guided tour of the Space Shuttle, though I don't know whether he provided any effects shots in the final film, if so, without screen credit.

A year or two later ILM sought out Alan to take over the matte department from his former apprentice, Harrison Ellenshaw, who though a founding ILM staffer left to take on Disney's gargantuan THE BLACK HOLE (1979).  Alan supervised the numerous mattes for RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981), as shown above, which won the Academy Award for the VFX work.

Alan's composite from RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK.

The truck full of Nazi's goes off the cliff in a completely fabricated matte and animation sequence from RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981).  That's Alan once again joking around with his impossibly tiny brush on a massive piece of artwork!

The final project that Alan would work on before quitting the movie business for good and retreating to his true love of gallery fine art was another ILM show, DRAGONSLAYER (1982).  The two fresh young trainees now under Maley - Michael Pangrazio and Christopher Evans - would remark how much they respected Alan and learned from him.

"Sadly, Alan Maley would pass away at the relatively young age of just 64 in 1995.  I miss him terribly.  He was my mentor and a very good friend".

                               Harrison Ellenshaw

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THE KING'S THIEF:  Skullduggery and Swordplay

A fairly mediocre costume epic from MGM, with all ill-cast Roger Moore in Restoration period action.

This 1955 CinemaScope epic has a few good Newcombe matte shots, including a pair of beautiful Matthew Yuricich paintings, which have recently been shared with me by Dirk Yuricich, to whom I'm most grateful.

Strictly run-of-the-mill, but the mattes are nice.

Before and after 17th Century London matte art by Matthew Yuricich.

Matthew rescued this and a number of other of his old MGM era mattes from the studio during that terrible time when Kirkorian was on a rampage bulldozing the vast back lots and selling off all the props and artifacts dating back many decades, with the old Newcombe matte building being such a casualty, and a thousand mattes were either junked or 'lifted' by opportunists.  Luckily, a great many survived in private hands and have since shown up at various movie auctions etc.

Close up detail.

You want detail....Pete gives you detail!  I'm talkin' to you Stix!

Classic MGM draftsmanship, under the supervision of the eccentric Warren Newcombe.

Typically, Newcombe would have his artists work with goache and fine pastel crayons to render their mattes, and although that doesn't sound ideal, the results were very effective, with MGM's style of soft matte blends being among the best in the business, with matte lines rarely ever visible.

Matthew had fond memories of the pair of mattes he rendered for THE KING'S THIEF (1955)

Now, this is an interesting shot.  In fact, it's a stolen shot taken from an earlier Paramount picture FRENCHMAN'S CREEK (1944).  The original Paramount footage has been optically altered to fit the CinemaScope wide-screen format for the MGM film.  The two lower frames are from the original 1944 movie.  See below for more info...

A wonderful on set behind the scenes photo demonstrates the set up for the original FRENCHMAN'S CREEK gag.  The whole deal was a foreground miniature, with the large 3-Strip Technicolor camera mounted on a nodal head for a broad pan across the landscape onto the supposed chateau.  Interesting backstory here:  The man in the white shirt is visual effects cinematographer Irmin Roberts.  Irmin worked for around 40 years at Paramount though never liked to talk about his work.  On barely three or four rare occasions Irmin invited his family to a set to see what he did, and this was one of those ultra rare days.  That's Irmin's family up on the rostrum, and the young boy on the stool found this incredibly exciting and 'magical'.  I know, because a few years ago he told me so and sent me this photo.

Another interesting little story:  When the Paramount head office in New York heard that the production had 'constructed' an elaborate French Chateau expressly for FRENCHMAN'S CREEK, they hit the friggen' roof!  Screamed blue murder at possible cost over runs, until they were told the real story!  Though, as usual, I digress..........

A dapper, sword twirling young pre-007 Roger Moore clambers out of the bell tower and climbs down a rope.  See below.......

An absolutely magnificent painted matte by the multi-talented Matthew Yuricich.  As an avowed devotee of extreme perspective matte shots, this one's an all out winner for NZ Pete.

Detail

I know Matthew was especially happy with his work on this difficult shot.

Beautiful detail work and sense of light.

Thanks to Matt's son, Dirk, for sending me these wonderful photos.

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MEXICAN HAYRIDE:  Hilarity South of the Border.

I like the old time comedy acts such as W.C Fields, Wheeler & Woolsey, Laurel and Hardy, Jack Benny, Hope & Crosby, Olson & Johnson and most especially The Marx Brothers.  This Abbott & Costello vehicle is typical and good for more than a few chuckles.

MEXICAN HAYRIDE (1948), with Special Photography by veteran David Stanley Horsley.

From an old edition of American Cinematographer

The film has a handful of rather nice mattes by Russell Lawson as well as some cleverly executed optical gags by Millie Winebrenner and Ross Hoffman.  In this shot, more than half the frame has been added in by the matte department.

A dual plane matte shot, with all architecture above the heads of the extras being painted in, as well as a separate 'moving' plane of artwork with the sky.

As with the former shot, this too is a multi-plane affair, with live action foreground, painted bullfight arena and a separate painted sky with drifting clouds.

The main comedy set piece involves Lou Costello having it out with an enraged bull.  Sounds pretty straight forward but a good deal of optical wizardry was needed.  The bull has been meticulously added to otherwise safe footage of Lou through hand drawn rotoscope mattes.  Horsley was an expert at this sort of thing - following in the footsteps of his father Stanley Horsley and moreso, his mentor and former boss, the legendary John P. Fulton, to whom such optical puzzles were like 'bread & butter'.

Fairly long cuts of the comedy action must have required days (or weeks) worth of careful rotoscope work by Universal's Millie Winebrenner, with the bull charging to and fro, in front and behind Lou.  Millie was a long time veteran in the effects department, having worked with Fulton on the INVISIBLE MAN pictures, Clifford Stine on THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN, Hitchcock on THE BIRDS and with Al Whitlock on countless films such as DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER and EARTHQUAKE.

"So, who's on first?"

Note the shadow under the bull, also roto'd in, but oddly facing the wrong way(?).  I did a massive two part blog a while back on Comedy Film VFX, where many mind boggling examples can be seen from other classic Abbott & Costello flicks such as A&C MEET THE INVISIBLE MAN and many others, where not just matte art but complicated optical gags are demonstrated - and they are still very impressive.  Click HERE and HERE to read the 2 parter.

Neat bit where Lou crosses his eyes and the bull does the exact same, with the aid of Winebrenner's cel animation gag.  Interestingly, Horsley had a celebrated career at Universal, with important VFX work on things like the amazing BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935), and important work on all of the sci-fi and monster shows the studio pumped out.  His career came off the rails midway through THIS ISLAND EARTH (1955) when, as a result of studio politics, David was 'let go', as the Hollywood saying goes.  His former boss and mentor Fulton got him a job on the massive TEN COMMANDMENTS over at Paramount shortly after, photographing the elaborate titles.  Not much else was forthcoming until he got a gig doing blue screen shots for Fox's THE LONGEST DAY (1962) and was D.o.P on the fantasy flick JACK THE GIANT KILLER the same year.  David's last job was as miniatures consultant on THE BATTLE OF MIDWAY (1976).

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THE DEVIL AT 4 O'CLOCK:  All Hell Breaks Loose

Great poster art of the type never seen anymore, sadly.

A big budget, all out disaster epic with an A-list cast of pro's, THE DEVIL AT 4 O'CLOCK (1961) might have been a bit of an overly histrionic affair, but many of the effects still stand up today.

What do you get when you mix a devout, two-fisted, boozing Catholic priest, a horde of cute leper kids, a trio of stranded death row bandito's, a blind promiscuous native gal and a simmering volcano ready to pop it's cork??? (no, this isn't a joke...)

From the trailer

The film is packed with effects shots of variable quality, though for the most part, pretty good.  Some in fact are remarkably well done.  This shot has a (very, very large) miniature volcano soft matted onto the location set.

The huge effects roster for the film were the work of veterans Lawrence W. Butler, Donald Glouner and Willis Cook - none of whom were screen credited.  Shame on Columbia for not putting up a single credit for effects!  Pricks!

The massive 'miniature' of the volcano and surrounding landscape was constructed on Larry Butler's rural ranch.  The set proved a dual purpose.  Apparently Larry wanted to have a big artificial lake dug out for his property, so the excavations were perfect to build up the DEVIL volcano.

Miniature added via blue screen.

A look inside the gaping throat of the steaming, lava filled beast.

The flick has a number of matte paintings too, of varying quality, with some being excellent and others far less so.  Everything here painted except a portion atop the (painted) bridge for the truck to proceed.

Matte shot clapper board of Butler-Glouner

The best matte in DEVIL AT 4 O'CLOCK has always made me possibly suspect Albert Whitlock's hand as he did a fair bit of work over those years for Butler-Glouner.  As an aside, Al would later hire Donald Glouner's son Dennis as matte and optical cameraman for quite a few years at Universal and later at Illusion Arts with Bill and Syd.

Matted area with very well blended in slice of live action truck journey up to the leper colony.  That sky and receding light really has a Whitlock feel about it to me.

The chief benefits of building a bloody great big model volcano, and shooting it out doors in natural light.

The pyrotechnics scale very nicely, and the lava flow is spot on too.  How could Butler and Co. not get a damned screen credit here?  Unbelievable!

Volcano model matted in very well indeed, and aided further by introducing optical 'shake' on Glouner's printer.

Now folks, this sequence is a gem.  Our pissed off man of the cloth, Spencer Tracy, persuades pilot to fly a plane over the volcano and through the dust, ash and all of that volcanic shit, in search of survivors from the leper colony.  Brilliantly staged and photographed - you can see the plane there in these frames mid flight, and I assume it was a real one filmed at quite some distance for safety, with the pyro clear of the air flight danger zone.

Note the small aircraft dodging the flaming rocks and lava.  Superb sequence worthy of an Oscar nomination at least... but don't get me started on Oscar injustices, let alone fucken''screen credit' omissions.

Now this is how you replicate a volcanic event... as opposed to example pictured below(!!)

Now folks, please keep in mind DEVIL was made some two decades before the atrocious Irwin Allen disaster laugh-fest WHEN TIME RAN OUT (1980) - aka THE DAY THE WORLD ENDED in some countries like here in New Zealand (it bombed, badly!).  Awful vfx work throughout, even from the highly experienced and multi award winning exponent L.B Abbott, who seems to have phoned this one in!  Best asset in the Irwin Allen flick was Jackie Bissett's perfect, figure hugging T-shirt (!!)

One of the cinema greats was Spencer Tracy, though he pretty much mugged his way through this one and chewed more scenery than Godzilla.  Hard to believe he filmed this the same year as the brilliant JUDGEMENT AT NUREMBERG (1961)

Another matte shot with group of lepers, cons and an angry priest on their trek to safety (or not?)

All painted except tiny slot of live action.

Minor matte fix, as with the old days, just to conceal the top of the stage and the lighting rigs etc.

Another 'top up' matte, with upper rocks and such painted in as a soundstage fix job.

Combination shots, with upper involving painted foreground, live action set and big process screen miniature action.

People coming down through the bush.  Stage set with upper portion painted in, just above the actors .

Full painting augmented with some miniature vegetation in close foreground.

Largely matte painted, with areas of actual set to allow for actors to engage in death defying feats.

A rough demarkation 'between fact and fiction' as I like to call it.

Broken bridge and a lava flow some 500 feet down the canyon.  What could be easier?

At least they didn't write in a couple of retired, elderly, geriatric circus tight-rope walkers (!!) to get across, as Irwin Allen would do with his near identical scenario 20 years later!  No, I'm not making this up.

Multi-part composite involving matte art, live action set and performers in front of a blue screen, and Butler's volcano spewing as background plate.

Fine miniature work here, and well combined with live action.

DEVIL has a huge number of blue screen shots - even for insignificant jungle trek scenes and such - with some bleed through noticeable at times, with backgrounds 'ghosting' partly through actors.

'Like a bridge over troubled lava.....'

I've written much in the past about Larry Butler.  One of the legends of the trick shot business, and part of a family long line of cinematographers and trick men going way back.  Larry was head of effects at warners for years and turned out some of their best and most memorable vfx work.  Films such as the jaw dropping THE ADVENTURES OF MARK TWAIN (1944) being a fine example that still leaves me stunned.  Butler moved over to Columbia and headed up their effects unit for many years, and formed a partnership with cameraman Donald Glouner.  Years later they set up their own independent effects facility and worked on a ton of films until they closed it down in the mid 70's.  I think all of Larry's sons became cinematographers, and notably did amazing aerial camerawork on the still fantastic TORA!, TORA!, TORA (1970).

Poor Bernie Hamilton gets the world's biggest splinter in his belly!  That's just gotta hurt.

Tracy on the left and Sinatra on the right.  Will these two foes come to some amicable arrangement just in the nick of time?  Unlikely.

Poor ole' Spence has one of those"Oh, shit" moments.  Yeah... where is your so-called God now?

Extremely good mechanical effects and staging here, for what I think is one of the all time great eruption effects sequences.  Makes most others pale in comparison.

'Yes...the Earth certainly DID move!'

It's got to be the biggest and most violent eruption since the dawn of time.

Enormous blast that literally vapourises the entire island(!), engineered by pyro man Willis Cook, and expertly split screened into 2nd unit ocean plate.  Nice subtle 'after glow' added optically.

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KNUTE ROCKNE - ALL AMERICAN:  Bio-pic of a Football Star

Pat O'Brien and a certain Ronald Reagan star in this 1940 Warner Bros classic.

Older readers might well remember or appreciate the film and it's sporting star.

The main character was from Norway, or so the titles stated...

Good matte art starts the film off, with the Warner's back lot transformed into Voss, Norway.

Matte shot of the Westpoint Military Academy, around the 1920's.

Byron Haskin headed up the Warners Stage 5 effects unit at that time and was responsible for assembling an expert staff to create countless trick shots and outright illusions on many of the studio's films.  Haskin was already an experienced cameraman through the silent era before joining First National, which became Warner Bros. around 1930.  Byron would much later go on to direct many notable features - usually with a fantasy or science fiction bent - such as WAR OF THE WORLDS, ROBINSON CRUSOE ON MARS and one of my all time vfx favourites, THE NAKED JUNGLE.

In his memoir, Byron Haskin spoke highly of his talented crew at Stage 5, Warners, which included chief matte artist Paul Detlefsen, matte cameraman John Crouse, effects cinematographers Hans Koenekamp and Edwin DuPar, and matte painters Mario Larrinaga, Chesley Bonestell, Hans Batholowsky and Jack Shaw.

A montage of frames from a quite remarkable effects sequence where the entire range of seasons gradually change through a single vantage point.  (see below, and toggle through them to see subtle changes).

Frame #1

Frame #2

Frame #3

Frame #4

Frame #5

Frame #6

Frame #7      I presume this was done with a series of glass overlays, with touch up work applied?

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THE BOY WHO COULD FLY:  Matthew and Michele light up the sky.

A reasonably likeable teen fantasy flick, THE BOY WHO COULD FLY (1986) was loaded with visual effects, courtesy of Boss Films' Richard Edlund, with several terrific matte painted shots by Matthew Yuricich and his long time friend and associate, Michele Moen.

Now, until very recently, I had no idea that this regular looking street shot was anything other than a regular street shot..... until I received a vast collection of surviving Yuricich matte art from Matthew's family (see below...)

Here is Matthew's remarkable painting!

Just look at Matt's sky.... such wonderfully casual brushwork, seemingly applied with abandon, but knowingly handled with the experience and skill of a seasoned pro who knows just what he's doing.

As Whitlock often stated: "The true special effect is the one that nobody ever notices".  Truer words were never spoken.

Moonlit night brings out the urge to reach for the stars...

Delightful matte painted sky as kid proceeds to flap his arms...

I'm not sure, but I suspect this down view is largely painted, as it would be the easiest and safest option.

Likewise with this angle.  Presumably it's mostly matte art.

..."are you sure about this?"

Multi-element shots with matte painted city in the distance and what I presume to be miniature buildings in the mid-ground to allow for a nice parallax shift.  Kids added via travelling mattes.

A very nice vista of the entire city as the kids fly across.  Nice details such as neon lights flickering and smoke from chimneys.  Matthew Yuricich and Michele Moen had a fair chunk of work to do on this film.

"Ever heard of the Mile High Club, baby?"

A staggeringly beautiful moonlit sky and cityscape.  Very poetic and 'old school' romantic.

The effects in BOY WHO COULD FLY must have looked a million bucks up on the big screen in the mid-eighties.  Matte painted suburb with fireworks doubled in, as kids perform in front of Richard Edlund's blue screen.

I can't help but think how damned awful this could look if done now in the 'everything goes' and 'let's push the computer to the limits' generation, where they just don't know when to quit, what with insane VFX art direction and suchlike.

..."I love the smell of gunpowder in the morning air...it smells like victory". (!!)

Truthfully, I reckon this chick secretly prefers a more, down to Earth kinda guy.

One of the original matte paintings.

"We really must stop meeting like this.  Air Traffic Control are starting to talk!"

Extensive matte art, supplemented with smoke and interactive light elements.

Full painting with cel animated lightning and rain element overlay.

Beautiful sky and other details from Matthew or Michele.

The boy is but a wee speck in the distance as he takes to the matte painted sky.

Totally unrelated to this film, an interesting peek at just how much an experienced matte exponent has to go through in this business (the face says it all).  I mean, this thank you card from Steven Spielberg on the 1941 set has the most atrocious handwriting I've ever seen after my own doctor, and Steven couldn't even spell Matthew's name correctly, for Christ's sake!

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KARATE KID 2:  It sure ain't Enter The Dragon, but it does have matte shots!

I never went for these insipid KARATE KID flicks - especially being a film-goer practically raised on Bruce Lee ('The Man'), Run Run Shaw, Golden Harvest and Jimmy Wang Yu epics.  KARATE KID 2 (1986) was only brought to my attention through my grandson who always sits through the end credits on movies, spotted a 'Matte Paintings' credit for Bill Taylor and Syd Dutton and, knowing my vague curiosity in such matters, relayed this vital info to me.  That's precisely what grandkids are for!

The flick takes place in exotic Japan, though may not have been shot there?  This is an unmatted location which will serve as the first of a handful of matte shots.

Here is a very rare test frame with Syd Dutton's initial, unfinished version of the temple and the sky.

Before and after with Syd's final version of the temple and gently drifting clouds.

By the time production was under way, Bill and Syd had left Universal and opened their own effects house, Illusion Arts, where their operation expanded considerably with the demand upon their services.

A subsequent cut shows the temple at a closer vantage point.

The initial frame from a very impressive bit of effects business where the kids come across the matte painted temple, as shown below...

Three part composite:  Matte painted temple and surrounds, with the pair of excited teens running across the painted composite via carefully deliniated rotoscope mattes courtesy of Catherine Sudolcan at Illusion Arts.

Matte composite before introduction of the rotoscoped kids.

I was really impressed by this brief scene and had to run the DVD shot back a number of times to examine the thing.

Construction of the basic temple set which will also serve in part as a live action component for a quite spectacular closing shot by Syd and Bill.

The partial temple set masked off for the dramatic finale.

Test shot with slate of Syd's initial painting, much of which will be substantially modified for the final approved matte tilt down.

The first frame from the final matte painted tilt down.

The tilt continues...

Final stage, onto the live action set.

Comparison minus the camera slate in this test version, which incidentally shows far more painted information around the temple.  The final screen version of the tilt is shown below...

Final version.....Just love Syd's sky.

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Two Tales of Two Completely Unrelated Whales...

1.  MOBY DICK:  The old thirties Vitaphone version.

The timeless Herman Melville maritime tale, MOBY DICK (1930) had been made before as a silent (also with the same star), and remade decades later in colour and more grandeur, but this version is pretty good on a number of levels.

While the fifties version may have been a bigger and more exciting production, this thirties one has an entirely more convincing Captain Ahab from John Barrymore, who was ideally suited.  The latter film's Gregory Peck was sorely miscast.

Warners-First National had a formidable special effects department, which I have discussed at length on previous blog posts, the unit created many quite amazing illusions through their heyday of the thirties and especially the forties.  At left is founding effects boss Fred Woodruff Jackman, who, along with his son Fred jnr, graduated from the silent era on Hal Roach and Harold Lloyd two-reelers.  The gentleman at right is Warner Bros. mainstay, visual effects cinematographer Hans Koenekamp - a technician that future VFX boss and feature film director Byron Haskin would call "the greatest effects man of them all". Years later Koney would state that he felt his best work was in the Robert Alda-Peter Lorre horror flick THE BEAST WITH FIVE FINGERS(1946).

MOBY DICK had a few matte shots in it, but what impressed me most were the ocean going scenes with whalers risking life and limb.

These whale hunting sequences were very impressive for the day.  Use of miniatures, some sort of mechanised or pupeteered whale and most of all, the stunningly well integrated shots where actual cast are seen in the chase boat with the huge whale ahead diving beneath the waves.

These scenes are baffling.  The combination shots can't be rear process work as screens at that time were made of sand blasted glass, and illumination would falter badly so big.  Perhaps assembled as Dunning or Williams travelling matte composites, though very clean work it is with no sign of ghosting or bleed through.  Perhaps made with some very carefully devised soft splits matting the two pieces of action as one??  Whatever, the work is very effective for 1930, which is why I wanted to present it in the blog.

Well shot miniature sequence by Hans Koenekamp, known as 'Koney' in the industry.

The big storm sequence was also impressive.  Excellent process projection and live physical effects work with mechanical rocking set.

Now, this is neat.  Massive wave sweeps over the deck.  Look carefully and there is a crewman standing there lower right, who gets obliterated with water!  I'm inclined to think this was a good sized miniature ship deck, and the crewman looks to be a real guy added in as a travelling matte, which is then roto'd to wipe the poor bastard out!  Impressive.

More fine miniature work with both the whale and Ahab puppets articulated.

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2.  DOWN TO THE SEA IN SHIPS:  Grand adventure on the high seas, also with a whale or two.

One of those forgotten movies that cry out for a decent BluRay release.

A terrific grand old time adventure with a sensational cast and outstanding special effects, DOWN TO THE SEA IN SHIPS (1949) credited both Fred Sersen and his long time right hand man, Ray Kellogg for the extensive trick work.

Three of the industry's best visual effects men were Fred Sersen, Ray Kellogg and Ralph Hammeras, all of whom served for the majority of their long careers at 20th Century Fox.  All were matte artists by training though their expertise would expand through to other areas of trick work, with Hammeras excelling in effects camerawork and miniatures as an example.

The Fox backlot and tank set up circa late 1940's before they built a new tank on their ranch at Malibu.

A fine cast:  the always excellent Richard Widmark, the legendary Lionel Barrymore and most impressively, the young Dean Stockwell - one of the biggest talents among child actors in Hollywood. As an aside, Dean, who would appear in scores of films over the decades, culminating in some wacky David Lynch projects, I was most intrigued to learn that he died right here in New Zealand of all places ... though I digress.  As an aside, I reckon Widmark's all time best was the chillingly brilliant British picture THE BEDFORD INCIDENT (1965).  See it today!!!

The film is loaded with matte shots, though I do wish I had a better copy or a BluRay to gather screencaps from.

Fox had a very large matte department at that time, with many talented artists.

Ray Kellogg was Sersen's senior painter, with Emil Kosa jnr being an important figure in the department for many years until his untimely death in 1968.

 

A great shot, though it was actually lifted from an earlier Fox programmer called SLAVE SHIP made some ten years before.

Other artists in the Fox unit that time included Barbara Webster, Charles Hulett, Chris von Scheidau, Cliff Silsby, Max DeVega, Menrad von Muldorfer and Fitch Fulton.

Fox applied the tried and true bi-packing of gently blowing foliage over their mattes such as here.

Effects cameramen at Fox included Ralph Hammeras, Bill Abbott, Til Gabatini, Walter Castle and others.

Excellent whale mechanisms allow for surprising levels of articulation, complete with blow hole.

Wave scale is excellent too in all of the tank shots, suggesting a number of small fans off to the side lending just the right amount of 'breeze'.

Good process work too, with addition of dump tank deluge upon the actors.

Very exciting sequences and so well orchestrated.  That's Harry Morgan (of M*A*S*H fame and 200 classic Fox westerns) getting crushed with the rapidly tightening line attached to the harpoon.

Just when they think things couldn't possibly get any worse, they come through the fog bank and collide with a damned iceberg.

Miniature detail.

The movie was submitted to The Academy for effects consideration that year, but oddly it was rejected.

The edge of the seat climax sees the ship wedged in the berg, with Widmark and Barrymore forced to take urgent action in literally manhandling the vessell off the ice.  A brilliant sequence as the hull of the ship is constantly swaying and violently 'washing' up against the people in death defying moments of bravery.  Terrific full scale mechanical effects done in the studio tank, and I'd say at some peril to the actors.

Splendid closing shots, possibly model work but I suspect perhaps painted ship on glass against exquisitely rendered painted skies.  Lovely shots here.

One of the original miniature rowboats now in a private collection.  Note the mechanism to simulate the oar action, and likely that of small puppet figures.

A sensational publicity paste up from the Fox marketing dept.

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***This vast and utterly exhaustive post, and all 184 previous blog posts known as 'Matte Shot', were originally created by Peter Cook for nzpetesmatteshot, with all content, layout and text originally published at http://nzpetesmatteshot.blogspot.com/ 

I have a vast collection of shots here, from a very broad cross section of movies.  As usual there are some very rare mattes that nobody has ever seen which should utterly delight the aficionados among you (you know who you are!).  There are a few well known films - at least to those of us of a certain age - and some long forgotten celluloid entertainments, the titles of which are largely lost to the mists of time, which isn't to say they shouldn't be celebrated.  There's some great work to be seen here even from quite minor and obscure pictures folks that I bet 99% of you have never heard of.  Also, for those who thrive on close up details, I've got some sensational hi-rez detail images from some very rare old time mattes that I just know certain matte friends out there will love.

So, we've got a never before seen Albert Whitlock matte that's simply glorious;  several very rare pieces from the family of Matthew Yuricich; a quanity of miniature and detailed matte fx shot breakdowns from an Emmy Award winning tv miniseries; several amazing before and after scenes from the celebrated Larry Butler & Donald Glouner;  a truckload of mattes from a big Warners costume epic;  a neglected RKO desert island classic .... and more!!! 

So, with that rambling intro out of the way, let us set forth on a journey of sheer wonder and amazement.

Enjoy, and I always appreciate any feedback and comments...

Pete  

***This vast and utterly exhaustive post, and all 185 previous blog posts known as 'Matte Shot', were originally created by Peter Cook for nzpetesmatteshot, with all content, layout and text originally published at http://nzpetesmatteshot.blogspot.com/ 

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ALBERT WHITLOCK'S MAGNIFICENT MATTE THAT NEVER MADE THE FINAL CUT:

This awe inspiring full matte painting on glass was rendered in 1977 by Albert for the very misguided John Boorman sequel, EXORCIST 2 - THE HERETIC, though it's unlikely anyone ever saw the shot. Although completed and shot, I don't think it's in the film.  This beautiful masterpiece was hanging in the foyer of matte cinematographer, the late Bill Taylor's home, taking pride of place, as well it should.

Bill said that the matte was in a preliminary cut of EXORCIST 2 as best he recalled it, though I've seen at least 3 different versions of the flick - which is probably 3 too many - and never managed to spot the shot.  The film had a confused release back in the day, and was literally laughed off the screen.  Warner suits demanded an urgent re-cut and re-jig to make it even slightly commercial (didn't help), so maybe this shot was jettisoned.  In a former life I worked for the local distribution arm of Warner Bros and recall the 'carry-on', with prints being substituted with revised reels shipped in at the last minute, though I digress...

Anyway, the painting (detail above) is 100% classic Whitlock in all his technique, feeling of backlight, sillhoettes slinking awaay into the haze.... just brilliant.  Al's time honoured brushmanship was as good as it gets.  Breathtaking.

In the ever expanding catalogue of excellent online specialty video featurettes, my friend Tom Higginson has produced yet another essential documentary on the Universal and subsequent Illusion Arts matte departments, with this entry being as comprehensive a guide as one could ever need on the step by step creation of a traditional matte shot.  This video may be seen here.

The essence of this documentary is the old 80's AIRWOLF tv series - a show that Tom seems to have an inexplicable affinity for - with detailed progress of some fine Syd Dutton brush skills and Bill Taylor composite photography.  I've seen the pilot but I don't recall whether the actual series was ever shown here in New Zealand??

The doco is loaded with clips, not just from AIRWOLF, but various before and afters from other Universal shows like TALES OF THE GOLD MONKEY and various others, to illustrate Syd's amazing skills.  There are plenty of behind the scenes snapshots of the various members of the matte crew at work, which in themselves are priceless, and a dazzling slow flyover across the entire Universal Studios lot, which I found just brilliant.

Where the doco will really leave the viewer's jaw on the floor, are the meticulous and no doubt incredibly time consuming 3D recreations that Tom has rendered, to take the viewer around the Uni matte department and into the myriad of camera booths, painting rooms, showreel storage and pretty much everything except the toilet!!  This and all the other video doco's that Tom has produced may be found here.

 THE FILMUMENTARIES PODCASTS.

In another multi-media realm, I must heartily recommend the wonderful series of movie podcasts put together by Jamie Benning in the United Kingdom.  Jamie has carried out 108+ interviews - often at quite some length - with many notable film industry folk, and in particular matte and effects people such as Michael Pangrazio, Craig Barron, Dennis Muren and (soon) Chris Evans, among many others.  His most recent podcast was an illuminating conversation with former ILM matte artist, Caroleen 'Jett' Green.  Jamie's Filmumentaries site can be found here.

Jett's honest and very open interview can be heard righthere.

The effervescent Caroleen 'Jett' Green, seen here at work on a painting for GHOSTBUSTERS 2.

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A LONG LOST MATTE ARTIFACT SUDDENLY RESURFACES.

In my recent epic April blog post I covered - among other things - a grand old MGM musical extravaganza starring Esther Williams, MILLION DOLLAR MERMAID (1952).  We can briefly revisit the big money shot here, and not because of any form of dementia on my part, I assure you.  True!

As these tend to happen from time to time, a long lost matte painting suddenly arrives in my in-box, with the sender asking if I can identify same.  Well, of bloody course I can i.d this beautiful piece... it's from MILLION DOLLAR MERMAID which I had only just published up a month or so ago!!

The matte is in the collection of another of Matthew Yuricich's family - his daughter I believe - and had been tucked away for some time.  The painting (oh brother, would I love to own this one), was not the work of Matthew as he was still at 20th Century Fox at that time and hadn't made the big move over to MGM yet.

A masterpiece of matte art, with splendid perspective lines.  I am most grateful to the Yuricich family for the masses of material they have shared.  It's quite often that a reader or someone promises to send a particular 'amazing' matte that they own, yet the picture never shows up!  This is why I am forever grateful to folks like the families Of Matthew, Jan Domela, Irmin Roberts, Wally Veevers etc, and guys like Harrison Ellenshaw (a true gentleman!), Ken Marschall (incredible generosity), Gene Warren jnr, Mark Sullivan, Gerald Larn and Jim Danforth.

Note the absent flags which were later bipacked in as live action 'fluttering' elements.

This is likely the work of Matt's friend, Howard Fisher, as Matt has several of Howard's paintings in the family collection.  Matthew was fortunate in grabbing quite a number of wonderful MGM matte paintings when the studio were demolishing the old Newcombe department in the 1970's, with so much either being junked or lifted by non-studio people who just happened upon them.

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MYSTERY BEFORE & AFTERS FROM THE BUTLER/GLOUNER DEPARTMENT.

I've been most fortunate to acquire a sizable and exciting collection of, often amazing, before and after mattes as well as numerous miniature tests and out takes from Columbia Pictures, mostly dating from the 1940's, and for the most part, from the legendary effects man Lawrence W. Butler and his long time matte cinematographer Donald Glouner.  Matte artists working there at the time included Juan Larrinaga and Hans Bartholowsky.  What follows are a few choice examples, with other significant examples illustrated further down the current blog.  I will add more great Butler/Glouner shots in subsequent blogs, so stay tuned.

Sadly, many of the reels I've got aren't titled, though some I have managed to match up.  This live action plate, masked for not one but two different matte paintings, remains a mystery to me.

Matte comp #1, where almost all of the frame has been painted in quite invisibly.

Matte comp #2 from the same film.  Obviously a Civil War picture, made in the 40's, but the title is a mystery.  Any info forthcoming from readers would be appreciated.

Another great matte painting from Columbia - also from an unknown picture.

I always like to see the slate, or clapper in old fx shots, as we can see the matte line as well as often useful information on the slate as to director, year etc.  This era remains my favourite for mattes.

Finished composite, though as with that other Civil War film, this same 'plate' with beach and ocean will be used again for a revised version of the house, buildings and trees, presumably showing the locale at a different time in the same film.

The revised painting with many changes to buildings and foliage.

Final of the revised, or secondary matte shot.  Film unknown.

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NZ PETE'S HALL OF FAME MATTE SHOT - Part Two

In Part One, I illustrated one of the greatest mattes of them all, Skull Island from the original KING KONG.  Here is another entry in my continuing series of all time 'Hall of Fame' mattes...

After his initial tenure at Fox, Matthew Yuricich - along with fellow matte artist Lee LeBlanc and fx cinematographer Clarence Slifer - moved across to MGM.

One of the biggest projects Yuricich would ever work on was the mammoth William Wyler epic BEN HUR (1959).  Lee LeBlanc had replaced Warren Newcombe as head of the matte department and received screen credit, though Lee and Matthew split the matte load evenly between them, with this jaw dropping establishing shot being among Matthew's very best work.

As was the MGM technique, very large B&W photo enlargements of the partial set were made and shellacked onto hardboard, from whence the matte artist would paint either set extensions or in this case the entire city of Rome.

At the time, the CinemaScope optics had an unavoidable deforming artifact on the left and right edges of the frame - visible clearly when one watches old Scope films where a pan shot distorts curiously on the sides of the action.  As a result, mattes for CinemaScope had to be painted specially to accomodate that undesired optical distortion, by introducing a deliberate 'squeeze' painted into the left and right sides of the matte (or sometimes even paint the entire matte'squeezed' to begin with as latter day artist Ken Marschall would do) whereby anamorphic projection would 'unsqueeze' in near to accurate proportions.

A close up taken under raking light shows a myriad of tiny holes drilled into the Masonite to allow for simulated 'audience' movement.

The reverse side demonstrating the carefully arranged holes drilled, and sometimes covered with coloured gels, where backlight 'gags' would be introduced by Clarence Slifer when photographing the shot.  It's subtle, but as the great Al Whitlock once said:  "You may not notice it... but you do notice when it's not there".

Thankfully, the wonderful matte is still in fine condition, and in the care of one of Matt Yuricich's sons.

Strangely, BEN HUR won the Academy Award for Best Special Effects... but, and it's a big but.. that was only awarded in the 'mechanical effects, process shots and miniatures'category, (for the big sea battle sequence) and not for matte paintings!!  FX Oscars were broken down into 5 sub-categories for many years.  But don't get me started on fucken' Oscar injustices.................... Jesus!!!!

The final shot as it appears on screen.

The matte painting room at MGM in 1959.  Note the other BEN HUR paintings resting against the wall.

The film had several mattes, though mostly so-so photo blow ups with painted additions, though the main money shot was this terrific Cinderella castle.

A masterfully rendered Yuricich matte from THE GLASS SLIPPER that is absolutely dear to my NZ Pete matte art tastes.

Detail #1

Detail #2

Detail #3

Detail #4

Detail #5

Detail #6

Great poster ad-art of the type never seen any longer.  I still have thousands of old classic one-sheets and lobby cards, though a chunk were lost in the flood last year.  Fucking rain!

Evocative ad campaign, plus the magnificent French actress Brigitte Bardot, who though not the star, damned well should have been 'cause I've always had a thing for Miss Bardot... though I digress.

Warner's big Scope epic - one of many they made at the time when it was all the rage.  HELEN OF TROY (1955) was okay but not the best of the genre.  It might have been if Miss Bardot had been given more screen time, or even the title role.  Oh, Brigette.... we love 'ya baby!

Matte supervisor was Louis Litchtenfield, with the highly talented Robert Wise helming the show.  Bob Wise started off cutting classics such as CITIZEN KANE at RKO and went on to direct a couple of my faves such as THE SAND PEBBLES and especially the still excellent THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN.

Top left pic shows matte artist & photographic effects supervisor Lou Litchtenfield (left) discussing an effects shot with the head of production at Warners.  Other pix show various sets and unmatted scenes.

Before and after of one of the many sets built at Cinecetta in Rome.

Helen, as played by Rosanna Podesta, with her love interest Jacques Sernas.  The delightful Brigette Bardot is shown at lower left, and on reflection is probably just too damned cute to play a conceited bitch like Helen of Troy... or is it just me?

The film is packed with matte and effects shots, with some variable results, probably due to many different hands involved with the brushwork.

Lou Litchtenfield had an extensive background, starting off in the late 1930's on GONE WITH THE WIND (1939) at Selznick International as a lowly assistant to Jack Cosgrove and would go on to flip-flop between as many studios on films such as THE FOUNTAINHEAD (1949) and AN AMERICAN IN PARIS as he could to pick up new techniques from other artists such as Mario Larrinaga, Howard Fisher, Chesley Bonestell, Lee LeBlanc and Paul Detlefsen.

It's possible that some matte or glass shots may have been carried out directly at Cinecitta during or after production, but I'm not sure.  There is a possibility that Polish born matte painter Joseph Natanson may have worked on the film?  He had trained in Britain under the legendary Poppa Day and moved to Italy in the mid fifties to work at Cinecitta.  There are certainly many different styles evident in the painted mattes.

Live foreground and painted in distant scenery and sky.

At the time this was made, old timer Paul Detlefsen - who had been with Warners since the early 1930's - had retired to follow his passion of model trains and calendar art.  Lou had been with the studio for a few years now and worked on many of their films.

Other artists active in the Warners matte department included Vern Taylor and Jack Shaw - both of whom had done significant work alongside Lou on the Academy Award winning MIGHTY JOE YOUNG.  There were also Clyde Scott and Cliff Silsby.

I do wonder whether some shots may have been foreground glasses as opposed to post production mattes?

The film has yet to see any form of HD or BluRay release.

Travelling matte comp of the massive invading armada, presumably all, or mostly, models, possibly supplemented by matte art.

The invaders storm ashore.  Split screen with live lower frame and painted upper half.

A closer view, with parts of the army passing under the matte line, but who ever notices apart from me?

The quality of the trick shots varies greatly, presumably due to dupe process used for matte composites which in cases like this, bring out lousy contrast and hues all out of whack.

Probably extended with artwork?

Quite an effective scene with thousands of warrior hordes, almost all of whom were matte painted and augmented with small slot gags and such.

It was probably the biggest effects show for Robert Wise until he made THE HINDENBURG in 1975.

The film had several censor excisions made here in New Zealand back in the day, with this arrow through the neck and a few other shots being removed.  The orgy too proved problematic ... but don't they always??   ;)

Peculiar colour scheme here where the city has taken on a whole different hue for some unknown fx reason.  The fire effects were well done, and entirely simulated as vfx elements in the mate dept, with smoke added separately.

Slightly modified matte art used in two different scenes.

Probably the best matte in the show, with wonderful light and a terrific sky beyond.  Nice.

The mythical horse of the title finally makes an appearence... and the fools fell for it, hook, line and sinker!!

The orgy at the climax.... or should that read as the climax at the orgy?  I dunno??  Anyway, much shameless decadence occurs, and according to our then NZ chief censor of films, a little too much, with the ecstatic gal carried forth on a platter scene apparently deemed a little too much for Kiwi audiences in 1955, so out it came.

I may not have mentioned it, but the utterly divine Miss Brigitte Bardot was in HELEN OF TROY ... elle est magnifique!

A minor little 'B' movie from Columbia, THE WALLS CAME TUMBLING DOWN (1946) featured a very interesting matte shot from Larry Butler and Donald Glouner which is well worth inclusion here.

More wonderful footage I've acquired from the Butler-Glouner collection, with this being especially fascinating as it's a rejected take due to severe camera jiggle.  Click on it and toggle through the frames to see the screw up.  The matte eventually did get corrected and made it into the finished film, and it's a really nice shot that nobody would spot.

Far more painted in than one might expect, and very accomplished it was too.

A very talented artist was employed at Columbia throughout the 1940's, Mexico born Juan Larrinaga - the brother of Mario Larrinaga - and this work may be his or maybe Hans Bartolowsky who was also there.

Seriously misaligned matte jiggle evident, with the actual take bouncing all over the place.

The final as seen in the movie where the negative weave has been corrected, likely using an alternate take.

A very good and at times quite powerful drama set amid the musical world, LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME (1955) had a great headline cast, as unlikely as it may seem, perfectly paired.

These old hand painted lettered-titles are also a lost artform.

More old school MGM mattes from the Yuricich family, with this particular painting being a Howard Fisher rendering on masonite, that Matthew saved from destruction at MGM.

The composite shot, assembled by matte cameraman Mark Davis.

Close up of Howard's matte.

More detail.  Howard was Warren Newcombe's senior painter and worked on hundreds of mattes, dating as far back as the early thirties and forties on Oscar winning shows like the huge effects films GREEN DOLPHIN STREET and 30 SECONDS OVER TOKYO - with one of his notable works being for FORBIDDEN PLANET with that incredible Krell power plant tilt down shot - and much later worked for Linwood Dunn on IT'S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD in the early sixties.

The Newcombe department prided themselves with shots just like this, with beautiful theatre frontages and gliterring bulbs and neons.  MGM were top of the game with this stuff, and Matt Yuricich was often tasked with drilling out the tiny holes and afixing the coloured gels at the back.

These wonderful neon theatre signs are a genre all unto themselves, and one in which I'm very fond of.  I own a lovely old 1940's Newcombe 'theatre' matte painting, and it's always a source of enjoyment to admire it and even to back-light the still coloured gel 'holes' behind the 'light bulbs'.

A wonderful daytime exterior theatre matte painting by Matthew Yuricich for LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME.  Superb and complicated perspective drawing on the differently positioned lettering, especially at far right.

Final comp of the Yuricich matte art.

Close up

Love that skilled lettering work so much.

Alternate night view with flickering neons and such.

Click and toggle between the 2 frames to see the neon animation.

THE WINDS OF WAR (1983) was a mammoth tv miniseries, or really a maxi-series as it totalled around 15 hours as I recall.  A bit of an endurance test, but pretty good as I recall.

The series featured a ton of effects, from the standard full scale physical effects, through to complex miniature combat in the skies and the seas, as well as a number of excellent matte paintings.  The small company Matte Effects, operated by artist Ken Marschall (left) and cameraman/producer Bruce Block (middle) was situated within the vfx facility Fantasy II, run by Gene Warren jnr (right).

A large tank was constructed on the Paramount backlot, exactly where a similar tank had been built in 1955 for the epic parting of the Red Seas sequence for Cecil B. DeMille's THE TEN COMMANDMENTS.  The miniatures were built under the supervision of old timer Lee Vasque, who was enticed out of retirement for this assignment.  Jack Cooperman was in charge of miniature photography.

The miniature photography was mostly completed in a mere three weeks apparently.

Model cameraman Jack Cooperman and assistant Eric Anderson plus two grips, prep a ship for a sequence in the tank.

All round effects and production artist, Mike Minor, was vfx art director on the show.  Mike's career went back to things like FLESH GORDON and a number of low budget pictures.

A battery of fans and hoses supply a mother of a storm sequence.

Miniature air base shot in forced perspective against an actual location, and in natural light - always a bonus.

Excellent aerial sequences all carried out in miniature.  Some aircraft travel on wires - probably via a Lydecker system - while some shots used remote controlled models.

Leading man Robert Mitchum and various fx shots including a matte augmented view of London with barrage balloons above.

VFX sequence by Gene Warren jnr at Fantasy II.  Partial miniature with substantial pyro matted into an actual location.

Matte Effects was a small two-staff boutique fx operation in Los Angeles, founded and run by matte painter Ken Marschall and cinematographer-producer Bruce Block.  The company consisted of pretty much just one room in the Fantasy II effects facility where Bruce had a camera set up and solid, welded matte camera stand.  Ken, on the other hand, did the majority of his incredible matte paintings at his home, often on the kitchen table.  Practically all of Ken's mattes were painted on a special art card stock (top left), imported from Germany.  The bottom left pic shows one of the extremely rare occasions that Ken painted on another surface, in this case it's glass (which he was never happy working with), for a special 'display' glass matte for a vfx exhibit.

Plate for a Matte Effects shot:  The original scene shot at the Paramount Studios tank in 1982, with large miniatures of US and British cruisers depicting the naval rendezvous in Ship Harbour at Argentia, Newfoundland for the meeting between Roosevelt and Churchill on Aug 10th 1941.

The plate with an optical matte where the edges have formed an unexpected fringe that was difficult to deal with.

Ken's painting with airbrushed in fog banks.  More 'fog' was later added over the original photography to help disguise the matte line and add atmosphere to the scene.

Close up of Ken's matte art. All acrylics though Ken would occasionally resort to lead pencil, coloured pencils, Sharpie markers for super rich blacks, and often an acrylic gloss medium over certain areas to increase saturation and darken slightly when needed.

The finished shot with blends successful.

Gene Warren jnr wrote me a detailed piece on Ken and Bruce in 2015 which I included in the extensive three-parter on Matte Effects.  Interestingly, they first met by way of a shot brought to Gene by Larry Butler, around 1980 or so.  Butler was also instrumental in bringing WINDS OF WAR to Fantasy II.  Gene told me that a tiny and rather basic 12 x 12 foot room was built in the Fantasy II facility just for Ken and Bruce, and that was about all they needed to make amazing mattes.  The matte camera had both 4-perf and 8-perf capabilities, with the matte stand illuminated with just two baby spots (1000 watt quartz) with polarizer filters.  Gene's own Fantasy II optical department processed all the tests and did any optical reductions or other printer work.

A different view of Argentia, this time an evening shot.

For another scene in WINDS OF WAR Ken and Bruce had to create a wide view of Moscow in long shot.  Ken told me that director Dan Curtis wanted the Kremlin, which was many miles away, to look more red.  Curtis proclaimed "It's the Red Square...the Red Army...it just has to look red".  Curtis was in charge and made it known.  Ken: "So I had to adjust it, despite protests until he was satisfied, but of course Bruce and I knew that it reduced the credibility of the scene."

The concept sketch made by a member of the art department, and Ken's final painting propped up against his car.  The matte was donated to director Dan Curtis at the end of production.  The reader can appreciate just how small Ken painted his mattes, as his finely detailed brush work was quite the opposite of other matte artists who would block in and use time saving methods and a more loose approach.

From the final scene as a broad pan across.

Miniature trees were placed in front of the painting to lend a nice perspective shift, and Gene Warren added a nice lens flare as the pan crosses over.

A rough concept sketch over a frame blow up, done by a production member, formed the basis for a major action sequence taking place at Cavite, in The Philippines.

For the initial element of a row of burning buildings, a fairly basic miniature table-top set was set alight in the Fantasy II parking lot.  Ken described to me the Fantasy II facility.  "It wasn't huge, on an obscure side street in Burbank.  You could drive past it and not even know it.  I don't even remember a sign outside.  But they accomplished a lot there.  It was a family, really.  The majority of the employees hung in there with Gene and his partner Lesley Huntley for years and years, through thick and thin.  Dedication and loyalty.  Real team work.  Gene was always scurrying around, full of energy and enthusiasm.  Gene was a second generation effects man,  His father was an old time vfx man and a partner in the company Project Unlimited from the 1950's and 60's."

The live action plate matted off.

The burning miniature was optically moved to the appropriate area of the frame and split screened into the live action plate.

A new matte was then created to cover the bad match between the miniature and the foreground.  Into this opaque matte Ken and Bruce would make what they termed as an'orange base matte'.

Ken's bridging matte painting - one of many patch jobs matte artists have had to contend with. The 'orange base process' used here for this shot is by painting in odd low contrast greenish-yellowish hued IP colours and photographing on IP stock, which would 'read' as normal colours once the footage came back from the lab.  This peculiar matte process was the one preferred by fx people such as Douglas Trumbull and Matthew's brother Richard, where on films like BLADERUNNER Matt Yuricich was forced to paint in wierd colour schemes, which drove him crazy, to suit the chosen intermediate duplicating film stock.

Ken's 'orange base matte' ties the model and the live action but still needed final adjustments to conceal the matte line.  Ken said he wished he could have worked with a soft matte but as this was an entirely optical printer job, that wasn't possible.  Bruce and Ken preferred to work whenever possible with latent image o/neg matte shots.

The final shot once carefully blended.  Ken said this minor matte was quite a challenge, and has shown me examples of some of the seemingly smallest or simple mattes he'd worked on over the years which proved to be so incredibly problematic.

The Red Square sequence was a close call as well.  Here's a vivid pre-production concept painting and at right is Ken's almost final drawing which had more buildings in it than would be in the eventual painting.  Note the remarks for changes and alterations, presumably from the director.

The shot would be a three part composite, with two separate pieces of live action combined and a matte painting filling out the Red Square.  The archway (left) was one live element and some of the lower portion of the other building shot elsewhere (right) were carefully matted as one.

Ken's matte art, quite different from his initial layout drawing.

Close up detail.  Note Ken's rendering of light.

According to Ken the whole shot was completed on Feb 8th 1983, just days before the television premier.  He said there must have been some last minute changes to the scene, thus the close call.

For the big Pearl Harbour sequence Matte Effects were asked to create a master shot.  Here is the original plate shoot of the miniatures in the Paramount tank.

The black matte in place.

Ken Marschall's matte painting.

Final composite with airbrushed smoke

A frame from the miniature shoot in the tank, with a large painted backing.  The fleet will be extended considerably through matte art.

A quick paint onto a photographic print guided Ken as to the requirements of the shot.

Tank footage masked off.

Matte painting.  Note the painted in 'wakes' which will marry up when double exposed in with the miniature ships.

Detail

The finished shot, sans the lightning elements.

Close ups of the two lightning elements employed as part of the above matte composite.  These were backlit and DX'd in during a second and third pass through the matte camera.

AN IMPRESSIVE WARTIME DRAMA SET DURING THE BLITZ

An enjoyable and at times quite moving drama set in London during the bombing blitz of WWII, TONIGHT AND EVERY NIGHT (1946) featured a surprising amount of visual effects work by Lawrence Butler, Doanld Glouner and Ray Cory.

Almost all matte art here, with this theatre being central to the story, as The Music Box was a venue that literally would never miss a single show, despite all the mayhem going on around.  It was a symbol to keep up the morale of the Londoner's during the war.  I think it was based on an actual event.

Entirely painted signage.

Although it appears to be nothing much, this is actually a rather ingenious trick shot sequence.  The audience are watching a movie on a cinema screen.  Performers on screen do a musical bit and then march across in black & white and come off screen in full Technicolor.  Sounds a bit naff, but it's very well pulled off, presumably with carefully timed pre-shot rear projection and the same actors appearing on stage on cue in a continuous pan across.

Rita Hayworth watches the scene in disbelief.  A beautifully photographed and lit film by the way, with exquisite use of Technicolor.  Rudolph Mate was D.O.P.

Another matte painted street in London.

Before and after from the Butler/Glouner collection.  I don't think this shot made the final cut.

All painted from just above the doorway.

More of London, courtesy of Columbia's matte department.

An elaborate effects set up for a blitz sequence.

A multi part fx shot with matte painting, explosions, searchlights, and tracer fire.

It all looks great in Butler's showreels, but sadly far less so in the finished film where much of this complicated vfx work is obscured and difficult to see clearly.

As a stand alone stock shot, this was routinely recycled in other films such as George Pal's THE TIME MACHINE and others (Pal was a real cheapskate and stole so many shots from other films to flesh out his own shows!)  *Note the additional foreground miniatures or cut-outs here that have been employed to augment the matte vista and add another layer.

Longtime Columbia effects cameraman Ray Cory shot these explosion elements which would be optically combined with the big matte painting of London at night.

At left is the tracer fire element shot by Ray Cory which will also be added to several effects shots.  The tracer looked excellent, so whether it was straight cel animation, I don't know.  It looked too smooth.

As it appears in the final film, partly obscured by rooftop foreground structures, and as far as the BluRay goes, printed so bloody dark I had to lighten many night shots here just to illustrate them.  Why are so many BluRays mastered so fucking dark??  The old DVD was much easier to see.

All hell breaks loose, but the British still manage to somehow 'keep calm and carry on'.

Rear projected carnage over London.

Bomb devastation.  See below...

Butler/Glouner matte shot where almost everything above the actors has been painted in.

From the Butler showreel, these are far easier on the eye than the extremely dark BluRay edition.

Multi-element shot with live action foreground, matte painted set extension, searchlight animation and various explosions in the night sky.  BluRay frame lightened here considerably.

It's all supposed to be strictly 'blackout' time, but there's always some damned streetlights all lit up!

Nice matte comp from Butler's reel.  Matte extends just above the shop doorway.

Much destruction after the bombing.

Interestingly, it wasn't a full matte painting as it could well have been, with a curious patch for live action visible in the middle of the frame here, even though no 'action' or movement actually occurs there.

Nicely rendered post bombing wreckage.

The pub across the street is destroyed, and so is one of our beloved main characters.

Once again, a multi-element fx shot.

I've written a great amount in past blogs about Butler, in particular his work at Warner Bros in the early 1940's on some incredible effects shows.

I've no idea why these Larry Butler showreels are monochrome for the several colour productions included, but they are incredibly fascinating.

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MATTES ENHANCE PERIOD COMING-OF-AGE PICTURE.

A very typical 'soft & soapy' MGM picture, THE HAPPY YEARS (1950) was a sort of coming of age show set at the turn of the century.

There are just a few mattes in the film but I decided to include it as I have a couple of nice original mattes from the family of Matthew Yuricich.  Matthew wouldn't have worked on it as it was way before his tenure at MGM, so Matt would have picked them up when they were junking the old matte department.  I believe this one is the work of Howard Fisher, as Matthew described it when interviewed for my oral history back in 2012.

The shot as it appears in the film, where, oddly, the virtually full frame painting has just had actual foliage added beyond where the painted section ends.

Detail

Detail

Probable matte extension here.

What a wonderful painted sky.

Although I cannot confirm it, I suspect this matte may well have been rendered for THE HAPPY YEARS and not used in the final cut.  The town and buildings look very similar.  This is another matte from the Yuricich family collection.

Some detail.

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THE ORIGINAL 1940 VERSION OF A TIMELESS FAMILY ADVENTURE

Very few realise that long before Walt Disney made his version in 1960, RKO had made their one way back in 1940.

The timeless Johann Wyss book has always made for grand adventure, and I still vividly remember seeing the Disney version at the cinema (The Civic, I think?) back in the 60's as a kid.  This old rendition is quite good, with Thomas Mitchell always a treat to watch.

Vernon Walker was head of special photographic effects at RKO until his untimely death in 1948.  Vernon worked on such classics as the original silent LOST WORLD, KING KONG and importantly, CITIZEN KANE among many others.  Vern specialised as an effects cameraman and opticals man. He was nominated for an Oscar a few times, including SWISS FAMILY for Best Special Effects in 1941 - with this film being just one of 14 pictures nominated in the category that year.

This is s largely forgotten film worthy of rediscovery and certainly remastering onto some HD format.  It's very hard to find except crappy YouTubes, though the special edition 2 disc DVD of the Disney film actually has this old version included as an 'extra'.

There are a number of excellent matte shots in the film, with veteran old time matte artist Albert Maxwell Simpson providing the shots.  Simpson was one of the very first cohort of matte painters, having worked with D.W Griffith on BIRTH OF A NATION in 1914, and DeMille's original TEN COMMANDMENTS in 1923.  Simpson also worked uncredited on scores of films such as KING KONG (1933), THE PRISONER OF ZENDA (1937), REBECCA (1940) and the epic GONE WITH THE WIND (1939).  For years Albert was president of the Matte Artists & Illustrators Union.

Effective process with miniature.

Split screen with painted foreground rocks above actor's heads.  Distant island likely part of the same painting with ocean a separate plate possibly projected into matte art as RKO did quite alot of complex rear projected elements into painted mattes around that time on things like THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME and CITIZEN KANE.

The first of a set of wonderful before and afters, sent to me years ago by matte artist Mark Sullivan.

Final composite with Albert Maxwell Simpson's matte art.

The stranded family discover a potential piece of ideal real estate.

Matte painted tropical jungle, with much in common with a certain Skull Island.

Limited stage set masked off for a Simpson matte.

Composite

Live action component masked off for a most spectacular expanded jungle matte.

The adventurers build their new home using remnants of the holed ship.  What a wonderful cinematic jungle as painted on glass.

Probably a process shot with miniature ship in a tank projected in.

***This vast and utterly exhaustive post, and all 185 previous blog posts known as 'Matte Shot', were originally created by Peter Cook for nzpetesmatteshot, with all content, layout and text originally published at http://nzpetesmatteshot.blogspot.com/ 

Greetings to all who are particularly partial to the long lost era of traditional, hand painted mattes and other ingenious motion picture 'tricks of the trade'.  It is indeed that time again - perhaps a little overdue according to some of my faithful correspondents - for a veritable cavalcade of amazing (and in a few isolated instances, perhaps not so flash) special photographic and miniature trick shots from across the long and wide cinema spectrum.

As is my self anointed vfx historian warrant, I've assembled a broad cross section of incredible films, with, in most cases, some terrific visual effects sequences.  There are a few films known to some; a bona fide Oscar winning classic; a cheesy 60's genre mish-mash; a couple of smaller gems that nobody will have heard of; a tiresome Technicolor musical; an expensive sci-fi mini-series from the late 70's; some more amazing Yuricich mattes that were thought lost; a selection of great Butler/Glouner shots from old Columbia pictures, and if that weren't enough, not one, but a pair of silent pictures - one a well known classic and the other a long, long, long forgotten disaster epic from the twenties that simply blew my socks off with the outstanding effects work!  Just because they don't have 'sound' or 'colour' doesn't mean they should be flagged as 'unworthy' my friends!

For the uninitiated, try to broaden your cinematic horizons and check out some incredible trick work from near on a Century ago of outstanding quality in today's post....

As this is the last post for 2024, what do I have in store for 2025?  Well, I'll be highlighting a series af never before seen matte paintings from French cinema that have just been generously shared with me.  Also, more from Matt Yuricich as well as the Butler/Glouner showreels.  I've been meaning to publish NZ Pete's 100 Best Special Visual Effects Movies (or individual shots)...  as well as a Matte Painted Journey Through Time, with a multitude of mattes from the beginning of time, as it were, through to the future!  That's a tall order, but will make for a fascinating adventure.

So, sit back, with your drink of choice, switch off that damned phone, and enjoy..........

Pete

***This vast and utterly exhaustive post, and all 186 previous blog posts known as 'Matte Shot', were originally created by Peter Cook for nzpetesmatteshot, with all content, layout and text originally published at http://nzpetesmatteshot.blogspot.com/ 

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NZ PETE'S HALL OF FAME MATTE SHOT: Part Three

A favourite area of historic interest for me books and films about POW's and escape and evasion during the two World Wars.  I can't get enough regarding the infamous Colditz castle, and have many books on the topic.  There was a good British tv series back in the early 1970's and the classic Guy Hamilton film from 1957.  Today's 'Hall of Matte Fame'matte comes from that very motion picture.

This masterpiece of matte rendering was the work of long time Shepperton master matte painter Bob Cuff.  Fellow Shepperton artist, the late Gerald Larn once told me how this particular glass painting was, for a some time, mounted up on the wall of the painting room right opposite his own easel, and that Gerald found constant inspiration and admiration for the rendering.  The piece - along with various others such as old Poppa Day glass mattes like HENRY V - would decorate the walls, along with various miniatures from assorted pictures, and would occasionally be replaced with other works at odd times.  I asked Gerald whatever became of them when they came down.  His response: "I really don't know where they went.  Maybe Wally [Veevers] had them stacked under his bed?"

Before and after on the studio backlot, and matte painter Bob Cuff shown here.  Bob started at Shepperton just after Pop Day retired and Wally Veevers took over the department.  Bob continued on until the mid 1960's and then went off with Les Bowie and Ray Caple as Bowie Films and later as Abacus Films, doing a great deal of work on things like ONE MILLION YEARS BC, THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH and YOUNG WINSTONE.

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MATTHEW YURICICH:  Some more old mattes dusted off.

As covered in several previous posts, the family of Matt Yuricich have been very generous in sharing many lost and rare paintings that Matthew did, with many being a bit of a mystery.  This one was marked as 'Borneo-Camels', which suggests to me it might have been for a Camels cigarete commercial, and set on the island of Borneo?  Anybody recognise this one?  Let me know.

The famous Lincoln Memorial matte from LOGAN'S RUN (1976).  All of the mattes from this film are now in somewhat rough shape due to the fact that Matthew was instructed to paint in hundreds of years worth of aging and vegetation directly over large format mounted photographic blow ups - which normally wouldn't have posed a problem as it was common practice at Fox and Matt was a dab hand at such methods - though for the LOGAN'S RUN work, effects boss Bill Abbott demanded they use colour photo enlargements to paint over rather than the old establish B&W prints.  The dyes in the chemistry were, in Matthew's own words,"a real son-of-a-bitch"...with the red chemistry seeping through, and even the most opaque green Windsor & Newton pigments from his brush coming out like "baby-shit brindle brown!"

For comparison, here's the shot from the final film, with even here a pinkish hue leeching through.

Matthew at work back in the mid fifties.  The film here is the MGM medieval period CinemaScope Lana Turner-Roger Moore costumer DIANE (1956), and one would never suggest a matte of any sort applied here.

The original matte art on masonite panel (that's hardboard to us) still in pristine condition in the care of Matt's family, who incidentally had no clue as to it's title till NZ Pete recognised it after some initial head scratching.

Close up, though sadly much was cropped out when the final tighter framed composite was made.

Fascinating before and after photography with substantial set extension for the film IT HAD TO BE YOU (1947).

The final, flawless composite.  Interestingly, they must have had some camera registration problems because I viewed the showreel and the first take had so much 'jiggle' along the blend that it looked like a quake was in progress!  Second take was steady and good to go.

Columbia made a shitload of low budget 'Jungle Jim' quickie potboilers, often with matte work.  This excellent matte was from THE LOST TRIBE (1948) entry in the series.

Did Weissmuller ever do an 'urban' film?

A complete mystery here.  A military establishment somewhere, with almost everything rendered by the Columbia matte artist.

The final shot, though in this extended out-take the soldiers marching along the lower left are all 'headless'as they are partially under the matte line. Bizarre to say the least!   I assume a subsequent take remedied this?

I originally saw this 1979 marathon back in the day on television, spread over many nights.  Quite good in parts, and utterly incomprehensible in other parts.  I think it may have been rehashed and updated recently?

Effects wise, the series was a definite 'mixed bag'. Veteran British all round effects expert John Stears oversaw it all.  Stears began his career as a matte painter for Rank, and gradually moved into models and physical effects on shows like the R.A.F true story REACH FOR THE SKY, the first STAR WARS and all of the early Bond pictures.  Ray Caple handled the many matte paintings quite efficiently, and presumably rendered them at his home which he usually did.  The show was severely let down by the atrocious model work sadly.  For such a big budget series with big name effects staffers, the miniature work was shoddy beyond belief, as will be demonstrated...

Matte artist Ray Caple.  Ray got his start when, at the young age of just 15 he was taken aside by Les Bowie and taught the technique of matte work on early, though important Hammer shows like THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT and many others.  Ray worked frequently with Les on and off up until SUPERMAN-THE MOVIE, which was Bowie's final film.

Foreground miniature with what appears to be a large painted backing.

Some of the aforementioned model shots.  Seemingly shot all in camera with minimal - if any - depth of field, whereas second spaceship is totally out of focus.  For 1979 this was inexcusable.

Poorly lit and staged to minimal effect.

How NOT to do a miniature shoot,  with what looks to be a 500mm lens, at 48fps and at an f2.8 aperture.  Not even fx shots from the silent era were as clumsy as these, as you will see so brilliantly in subsequent coverage further on in this very blog post of THE JOHNSTOWN FLOOD made in 1926 no less, though, I digress....

Overhead view a bit better.

Oh, brother... not even DAMNATION ALLEY (1977) got it so wonky as these exceedingly poor model shots.  Interestingly, the model shots were done and photographed by Bob Kindred who did similar work on the otherwise marvellous Richard Donner classic SUPERMAN (1978).  Kindred came in to do 'additional model photography' on the dam collapse sequence afterDerek Meddings and Paul Wilson had left due to start dates on the Bond flick MOONRAKER looming.  Donner, in the SUPERMAN audio commentary said how much he fucking hated those 'additional' dam shots of the 'little town', with a passion.  Same problem:  long lens, very little depth of field.

Model foreground set and painted landscape.

Ray Caple matte shot.

Rocket ship is virtually all painted in, just above the lower visible descending hatch.

Variation on same view.  *Toggle through frames to see subtle matte transformation.

*Frame 2

*Frame 3

*Frame 4

*Frame 5

*Frame 6

Caple matte painted deserted city.

All painted just above headline of Bernie Casey and Rock Hudson.  As an aside, Casey was great in schlocky 70's flicks like DR BLACK AND MR HYDE (yeah, that's a real movie!) and a later 1981 top shelf fave of mine, the Burt Reynolds actioner SHARKY'S MACHINE.  Terrific cop movie.

Rock sets out on a voyage of discovery.  Actually a fairly under rated actor was Hudson, who, among the drek he was often thrown into, turned out some top shelf performances on occasion with the astonishing John Frankenheimer sci-fi thriller SECONDS (1966) being a masterwork.

Matte art rocketships added in.

'Didn't I tell you never, ever, to shoot a model set with a long fucken lens and focal depth the thickness of a sheet of paper!'

Location augmented with much Caple matte art.

The series was divided into three separate sub-storylines, with the first one being the most coherent as I recall.

Not sure here, but suspect a miniature structure.

Rather good matte here by Ray Caple, as the trek across the alien desert begins.

Another excellent Caple matte.  Love the distorted perspective.

More matte work by Ray as Fritz Weaver and Roddy McDowell explore the environs.  I love character actors, and Weaver was an excellent actor in films as varied as Sidney Lumet's chilling nuclear threat masterpiece FAIL SAFE, John Schlesinger's thriller MARATHON MAN the frightening AI sci-fi flick DEMON SEED and many more.

I can't remember exactly why, but the whole kaboodle goes up like the 4th of July.

"I love the smell of napalm in the Martian atmosphere..."

MY NAME IS JULIA ROSS:  An efficient little known film noir worthy of rediscovery.

I love older films, and it's gratifying when one of my very long time blog readers recommends a title to me, just as my NYC pal Steve did with this otherwise unknown little gem.  Thanks Steve for this and all the other 'matte notifications'.  :)

Made in 1945, JULIA ROSS only has two mattes, but the key shot is excellent.

I was lucky to find this 'before' frame among the many shots on the Butler/Glouner showreels.  The 'Cory' slated here is Ray Cory, who was a long time vfx cameraman at Columbia for many years.

A superbly gothic matte in the classic sense.  It's shots like this that make me love that particular era of the matte art medium, the 1940's.

The only other shot was this night view, which looks like the same matte printed down a few stops.

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CAN'T HELP SINGING:  Lush yet tedious song-fest, out west.

The 1944 Universal film was filmed in near retina-blasting vivid Technicolor, though in it's favour it did have a few nice Russ Lawson mattes and old time character actor, the great Akim Tamiroff - who must have made near on 1000 flicks!

Although uncredited, John P. Fulton oversaw the effects, which boiled down to a handful of mattes. At left is the film's star Deanna Durbin astride a chopper with Fulton on the Universal backlot.  At right is a later photo of John with his three Oscars (I think they might have been lost in a devastating wildfire?) for WONDER MAN, THE BRIDGES AT TOKO-RI and THE TEN COMMANDMENTS.

Deanna Durbin - not really my cup of tea, but I'd listen to her over that bloody Taylor Swift any day.

A dual-plane matte shot with the sky rendered on a background glass and animated to drift behind the main central matte art.  Veteran effects cameraman Roswell Hoffman was with the same studio for a massive career, stretching from the early 1930's through to 1974.  When he died, I found that he left a sizable bequest to either the American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) or The AMPAS Academy - I forget which.

A follow up shot from a closer angle, and again, with the drifting clouds, which was something Russell Lawson did quite often, though only in a rudimentary single 'block' of cloud drift, as opposed to much later Universal exponent Albert Whitlock, who mastered the art of splitting the sky into 'bands' and creating an incredible 'depth' in such animation as never seen before.

More matte work, with the distant tree line and wagons with horses all painted, as well as the sky with cloud 'drift'.

Universal backlot matted with Lawson's sprawling old west landscape.

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THE JOHNSTOWN FLOOD:  An incredibly well executed silent era disaster picture

I love cinema in all of it's forms and all of the technical aspects therein.  Every genre, every era, every language!  THE JOHNSTOWN FLOOD (1926) is a truly remarkable example of just how damned good film makers and technicians were in the early days of cinema.

This amazing 1926 mini-epic (mini only because it runs not much more than an hour in length) was based on the actual real life disaster that occured in 1889 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania - a disaster of mega proportions as I saw in a History Channel doco ages ago.

Made by a Mr 'Fox'(not his real name BTW... born Wilhelm Fuchs in fact) long before he turned it all into the massive enterprise 20th Century Fox.  To think of it as '20th Century Fuchs' you are just asking for trouble!

The only tech credit was for cinematographer George Schneiderman, with not a mention of 'Technical Effects' or such, which was surprising seeing as the FX work was of the highest calibre.

Janet Gaynor.... as cute as a button!

Our square jawed hero and one of the two dames he has 'on the go'.

Johnstown in pre-flood times.  An excellent trick shot which with much study I feel was a superbly arranged in camera shot, likely a hanging miniature positioned near the camera entailing the upper floor and roof of Joe Gallager's store, across the roof line and adding in most of the buildings from about halfway up the backlot street and on up the hillside.

All of the various establishing shots from vantage points of the town were miniatures or combination shots, and all of a very high standard.  Note the train going over the viaduct.

The large dam up in the hills above Johnstown - again, a miniature set.

All miniature, complete with a model steam train passing across lower frame.

This chap, Mr Hamilton, was the slimy mill owner who cut costs on safety and had his own prosperity sole of mind, not unlike his namesake half a century later in the classic JAWS, played by, ironically, actor Murray Hamilton ("Nah...we ain't gonna shut the beaches because of some errant goldfish... Amity needs tourists, and tourists mean $$$")

Spoiler alert:  Peyton was one lying bastard.

All miniature setting with steam train.

That damned dam will cause much damage...

The miniature sets must have been constructed to quite a large scale as the water scaling is really impressive and not at all an easy thing to pull off, especially back in the day.

Now, the attention to detail in so many of the vfx cuts is quite incredible.  Outlined here is pretty young Janet Gaynor on horseback in full gallop riding the ridge of the dam as it starts to crumble.  Many subsequent shots involve complex optical burn-ins of people and models to great effect.

The cloudburst was all it took to overfill the dam and push the mass of logs forward...

Everything, naturally, was shot in actual daylight, which is always a plus for such work.

The train vs the dam.... guess which comes off second best?

Pity the illiterate citizens of the town, for whom these intertitles will be meaningless!

Large miniature setting with steam train at lower right heading into doom...

As for what I regard as important effects sequences, I use as many frames as I can to demonstrate the efforts put in by the visual effects people.  No shortcuts or cheats on this blog site.  Note the substantial scale that really lends a dynamic, physical event to the proceedings.  Very, very impressive indeed.

Finding any research or credits for JOHNSTOWN has been a bit of a blank.  The best I could come up with was a Wikipedia page and a couple of old clippings which state the visual effects were supervised by E (Elmo) Roy Davidson, with miniatures by Jack Smith.  On Smith I know nothing, but Davidson I do.  Roy was a very experienced effects cinematographer (born 1896 - died 1962) who did some amazing work a few years later on the big budget Howard Hughes epic HELL'S ANGELS (1930), with some of the best miniature sequences of the time involving WWI airships, biplanes and ground offensives - all of them involving extensive model work and extremely well orchestrated and photographed (I must do a special on that flick as I have some great material).

The film relies quite heavily on early travelling matte optical photography, with scenes such as these where the cast are wiped out by a massive deluge, though all done optically.

Isolated frames show people being inundated with the water, and done so well as to have body parts still 'struggling' the torrent.  Jesus, this stuff was good!

As to camera speeds, I really don't know?  I assume the 35mm gear was all hand-cranked still?  Were there means to 'overcrank' for higher frame rates? Remember, this was nineteen-fucken-twenty six folks!  So impressive, and I've seen stuff made 40 years later that paled in comparison (they will be mentioned later...)

A word about the transfer.  I've seen a lot of silent era stuff, and even much of the 'remastered' and cleaned up footage of various titles never came even close to the incredible, pristine quality of the JOHNSTOWN BluRay edition.  The original nitrate 35mm elements were well protected, and the Eastman House did a jaw dropping job of cleaning up the near on 100 year old material.  Kudos to all involved.  I've seen far more 'recent' (40's & 50's) films on HD that didn't hold a candle to this one!

I guess the 'hard of hearing' in the town were out of luck when the alert was silently made(!)  Think about it,

My favourite vfx sequence sees a bunch of terrified townsfolk running for their lives as a massive deluge of foaming water and hundreds of logs come speeding down the mountain.

It's so damned(!) impressive that I've set out a multitude of frames below to toggle through, and even better on a proper sized screen.  *Users of those idiotic palm sized devices... go and stick to your inane Tik-Tok garbage please!

Incredibly, it's a sizable miniature set - house, forest, logs and water.  The people have been added quite brilliantly through an early travelling matte process, more than likely the Dunning Composite technique, which was quite common in the twenties and on into the thirties, competing with the opposition's Williams TM process on the other side of town.

Frame 2

Frame 3

Frame 4

Frame 5

Frame 6   *(note how the people are gradually enveloped with debris - a remarkable detail and a sign of much care in the optical process)

Frame 7

Frame 8

Frame 9

Frame 10  *(note the superb 'break-away' prep work on all of the models.  Brilliant)

Part of an article by the Dunning company which appeared in American Cinematographer, 1929.

Effects director Roy Davidson went on to have a highly regarded career at Columbia Pictures, with shows like ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS and LOST HORIZON among many more.  Roy then went over to Warner Bros and became director of the famed Stage 5 trick shot department for some years in the 1940's, with huge films like PASSAGE TO MARSEILLE and FIGHTER SQUADRON being two examples.

Another impressive and complex vfx sequence, again involving a large miniature setting, with a perfectly 'lined up' live action element of horse and buggy racing across the (model) bridge.

The cuts are brief but the studious viewer will spot ghosting and a small degree of transparency visible in the live action element - an artifact often seen in early optical TM composite photography.

The father and son developers of this optical process, Dodge and 17 year old inventor Carroll Dunning always promoted their technique in the Hollywood trades as "Shoot it today, view it tommorrow", with results available in a very short timespan.

The Dunning method was used quite extensively and could be seen in films such as TARZAN THE APE MAN and it's immediate sequel; KING KONG (log sequence), THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII  and another water logged disaster epic DELUGE.

Another Dunning sequence with towns people in terror.  Scenes like this must have given audiences nightmares back in the day.

The physics of the collapse were so impressive, with a true 'weight' and bulk in the proceedings.

Once again. look at that break-away house... just outstanding.  When compared with much, much later and utterly dismal fx efforts such as AVALANCHE and the twenty million dollar flop METEOR (1979), this silent footage is in a class of it's own.

I would give my left kidney to be able to see behind the scenes photos of this work!  Screw CGI, this was real creativity, with the most basic of tools available.

I presume the reader is 'toggling through' these successive frames?  If not, why not??

Note the careful (rotoscope perhaps?) work where folks are in, under, in front of or tossed aside!  Magic!

Apparently, Davidson and Smith went to the actual locale and sized things up first before retreating to Hollywood to replicate the many sets and props in miniature at the studio.

Vast miniature set, with the raging torrent coming down onto the town.

Water is impossible to 'miniaturise' well, so these must have been big-arsed model sets.

Arguably one of the most spectacular scenes is this where we see this massive tidal wave at the top of the street washing all away in it's path.  Oh, brother, this is a ripper of a set piece. Very similar flood/tidal wave opticals were attempted by Frank van der Veer for the extremely poor 1979 mega epic METEOR, with utterly dismal results that fooled no one, with water elements crudely doubled into the streets of Hong Kong.

A puzzling sequence to pull off.  Partial 'town' full size, with top of nearest building added on - as with the majority of the buildings from around the midway mark - probably as a foreground miniature, suspended strategically in front of the camera.  The torrent of water has been added as an optical element, and so well done it was too!  Remember... 1926 was the year they made this.

Actually, some outstanding vfx pictures were produced around this time such as the truly epic war film THE BIG PARADE (1925), which I covered in detail a while back.  Tons of glass shots, opticals and miniatures - often all combined in single amazing shots, supervised by the great Maximillian Fabian. My coverage of THE BIG PARADE may be found here.

I do wonder whether they did extensive hand drawn roto mattes for some of this scene, to articulate the water around the people who were clearly shot 'live' on the exterior set?

Overhead view of town under water.  Note the train passing over the viaduct.

Totally convincing miniature setting with church, as the floodwaters close in...

Down comes the (packed) church.  Yeah... where is your God now?

Wedding in progress as the walls cave in.

Stunning and jarring at the same time.  Excellent application of the Dunning matting process again.

Basically, the Dunning process involved a bi-pack camera containing a special orange-dyed master positive of the background plate/action, with this positive running through the camera in contact with raw negative film.  The foreground live action was illuminated with orange light, and was filmed in front of a blank screen illuminated by blue light.  The blue light caused the pre-filmed background action on the master positive to be printed onto the negative, while the orange light reflected from the actors passed straight through the dyed master positive, and exposed the negative in the normal way.  The actors - blocking the blue light with their bodies etc - became 'living mattes', so were combined onto the negative with the background action around them.  This variation only worked with black and white films, though later on, further developments came about for colour matting techniques.  I don't know how they did the other major long shot TM's, unless the people element was optically reduced substantially?

He never even got to kiss the bride...

The logs are quite a bit out of scale here with the buildings.

As from the History Channel doco I saw ages ago, it was a mass disaster for the area.

Just when you'd think it couldn't possibly get any worse........

.....it bloody well does!!!

Survivors afloat on debris now are confronted with an inferno.

Miniatures and matte split screen work for the fire sequence.

The film ended on a bizarre comedic, slapstick note, which seemed quite out of place, and belonged in a Harold Lloyd or Laurel and Hardy short, involving a steam driven motorcar(!)  But what the hell, I was extremely impressed by this film, not to mention the eye-popping resolution of the transfer.  I'd rate it as a visual effects classic.

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THE THIEF OF BAGDAD:  The Korda classic of tales from The Arabian Nights.

The Academy Award winning THIEF OF BAGDAD (1940), helmed by no fewer than four directors; Ludwig Berger, Michael Powell, Zoltan Korda and Tim Whelan.  I read that Production Designer William Cameron Menzies may also have had a hand in directing.

Sabu, June Duprez and John Justin star in this 1940 version.  Out of interest, I covered a fairly obscure 1961 Italian remake a while back, which had some good matte art in it, and that can be found here while in an attempt to be complete, I've reviewed the original 1924 silent version as well, which follows on in this very post.  Note, the dreadful 1978 version I think I covered briefly ages ago, buried in some post...

A mammoth undertaking which began production at Denham Studios in the UK, but then shifted gears and relocated to the USA due to the war, which the States at that time wanted no part in.

An interesting on-set photo with, I believe, Michael Powell at left, with possibly a couple of the Korda's at right(?)  Note behind them we can see part of one of the incredible 'hanging miniatures', which were utilised extensively throughout the shoot, and to superb effect.

For the most, the huge vfx workload was carried out by British artists and technicians.  The matte unit shown here was supervised by Walter Percy Day (top left); assisted by his son, Thomas Day, who photographed the mattes (top right).  A young Peter Ellenshaw (lower left) assisted Pop Day with the painting; while another of Day's sons, Arthur, assisted with layouts (middle).  Wally Veevers (lower right), who would go on to have a long career with Poppa Day, was visual effects cameraman, specialising at that time with photographing the hanging foreground miniatures.

A most revealing snapshot from the past.  Matte artist Pop Day, actor Sabu and special effects supervisor Lawrence Butler take a snooze during a break in set ups.

A large roster of effects talent were involved, though only Butler and Day received any screen credit.  These pics are of the optical printer set up devised by Larry Butler for the many THIEF blue screen composites.  There was some discussion later as to who and where the bulk of the TM shots were assembled.

A nice candid snapshot taken 7 years later on the Pinewood set of BLACK NARCISSUS (1947), with Percy 'Poppa' Day in a rare smiling attitude, while director Michael Powell and actor Sabu look on, possibly in bewilderment.

Nice model work, possibly shot in the tank at Denham?  I don't know who built the many non-hanging miniatures.  Future effects guys like Ted Samuels and Chris Mueller were on the crew so may ahve participated?

+

Bagdad - Evocative matte art by Percy Day and staff.

Toggle these two frames to appreciate the nice cloud drift above the city, which was painted on a separate glass.

A revealing before and after, from the original 35mm nitrate takes.  *Courtesy of Susan Day

An interesting comparison with the remastered BluRay shots, where these very old and fragile Technicolor clips hold surprisingly well, given they date back around 80 years plus!  There was nothing as permanent as the old Technicolor IB process, where colour stability remained incredibly well and permanently, compared with more modern film processing which simply turned 'pink' after a decade or two.

In addition to the fifteen painted mattes that did get used in the film, Day had also rendered and composited another eleven shots such as this one that would ultimately fall to the cutting room floor, sadly.   *Courtesy of Susan Day

Another deleted matte, similar to the above shot but with the ship added.  Shame about these being tossed, as they were really good and could have been used.   *Courtesy Susan Day

Effectswise, THIEF really set a standard with the extensive use of foreground hanging miniatures, often in creative and always undetectable ways.  This frame is the start of a pan following John Justin out of the market and into the city, with a great deal of that city being a carefully positioned miniature.

Englishman Johnny Mills was in charge of all of the hanging miniatures, with Wally Veevers photographing the set ups.

Revealing before and after.

Another on set snapshot showing the sparse physical set which the suspended 2 Dimensional miniature facade will eventually 'fill' and expand successfully.

A Percy Day matte shot which extends the view considerably.  See below...

Before and after matte extension.

Hanging miniature perfectly merged.

More hanging miniature work by Johnny Mills and Wally Veevers.  The method allows for camera pans and tilts once a special nodal head is utilised with the taking camera.

Latent image Percy Day matte shot.  See below...

Before and after originals from over eight decades ago, which to my eye, look better than the various video and other incarnations which I've seen, some of which looked awful.   *Courtesy Susan Day.

We pause briefly in our vfx coverage to momentarily take in the ethereal beauty of our leading lady, June Duprez.

...and now, we return to our advertised vfx coverage.  A matte painted set extension to cover up the lighting rigs and studio roof.  See below...

Before and after Percy Day matte.   *Courtesy Susan Day

An unused alternate take.

City at night via hanging miniature.

Panning across a hanging miniature.

A great cost saver.

Before and after Percy Day matte, though I don't think it's in the film.   *Courtesy Susan Day.

The quite magical 'toy palace' sequence where the bad guy, Jaffar (Conrad Veidt) entertains with his tiny dancers.  A multi-part set up here, with a pair of matte paintings, performers and this rear projected into the 'magic box'.  See below...

Before and after for the first view of the 'toy palace'.   *Courtesy Susan Day

Before & after for a second view.

Palace interior with painted top up.  Peter Ellenshaw had been working for Day for about six years at this point, though he would break things off not long after THIEF in order to join the RAF in World War II.  Upon his return after the war Peter resumed the working relationship for a bit but found it somewhat strained, and went off on his own.  The rest, as they say, is history.

Matted in top up on set.

The Sultan goes for the ride of his life on an automaton magical horse.  Soundstage set and backing, extended with matte art, and completed with the blue screened in horse and rider.

Set up for the above shot, where we can clearly appreciate the need for additional minor matte work to conceal the soundstage walls and ceiling, which was a common requirement in matte work for decades.   *Courtesy Susan Day

Sultan and flying horse blue screen shot.  See below...

Before and after where once again Day has painted in the upper set, though not so you'd ever notice.

Hanging miniature Bagdad with horse added via travelling matte.  According to visual effects man Jim Danforth - whose favourite film, THIEF happens to be - there were around 55 blue backing TM shots made, which were used in some 99 cuts.

There has been some debate surrounding the TM shots.  Larry Butler took credit (and an Oscar for the work), though some articles and interviews report English vfx man Tom Howard as having carried the blue backing workload.  In an interview with author John Brosnan, Tom stated:  "I did a great deal of work on Thief of Bagdad.  I had a hundred travelling matte shots in that film, and I'm credited with, according to Kine Weekly, the trade magazine, as being the inventor of the TM process in colour."

We once again interupt our scheduled vfx coverage to be stunned by the smile of the THIEF Princess, leading lady June Duprez.

We resume our advertised vfx coverage with this rather clever, though unused Percy Day matte painted set extension, where none would be anticipated.   *Courtesy Susan Day.

Our divine and fetching Princess is abducted by the evil Jaffar.  Who knows what awaits her?

Meanwhile, little Sabu has his hands full when washedd up on a desert island and unleashing a genie.  Some nice optical transition work here.  According to Poppa Day's grand daughter, Susan, her father Tom - who was Poppa's matte camerman - played the little 'Sabu' figure in this sequence when they filmed it.

More examples of the 55 odd blue screen scenes.

The Genie, as played to the hilt by Rex Ingram, with a voice that sounded suspiciously like actor Clark Gable(!)   'Frankly Sabu, I don't give a damn'

Not the best of prosthetic 'bald cap' appliances, which generally rarely ever passed a casual glance in many a film.  As an aside, the best and most convincing 'bald' appliance ever applied was by the great Dick Smith on Robert DeNiro for the mohawk in Scorcese's TAXI DRIVER.  Flawless, as one would expect from Mr Smith.... though I digress.

The Genie flies Sabu up to his mountain top temple.

Blue screen photography was by Wilkie Cooper, Stanley Sayer and Henry Imus.

The temple - a really nice shot.  I don't know whether it was a miniature or a painted matte?  It does have a 'painterly look' about it.

Interior a miniature with blue screened in people scuttling about.

Is this what they mean by a Tiny house?

Beautiful miniature set and stone idol.  The tiny Sabu is barely visible lower frame.

A tremendous model set.  Various tiny characters matted in scurrying around.

Part full sized set on the soundstage, augmented by matte painting.  *Courtesy Susan Day

Close up of the huge Vincent Korda designed set prior to matted add ons.

Test with Percy Day's artwork added to giant set.

Final as seen in the release prints with the red glowing all seeing eye.

Alternate view where Sabu inches his way around the idol in this masked take.

Unfinished test composite.

Before and after original 35mm nitrate frames with the original painting by Percy Day.   *Courtesy Susan Day

The final as seen in the BluRay editions.

Inside the idol's head before and after, though this shot never made the final cut.

I love the design of these massive spider web scenes.  I assume it to be a miniature (due to shallow depth of field focus) with Sabu doubled in.

Another terrific view in the spider's web.  Love that creative design.  Possibly matte painted, with Sabu, again, doubled in.

Sabu comes face to face with the biggest, bad-assed spider you ever saw.  The spider may have been constructed by Chris Mueller(?), though it was all shot by a separate unit by Edward Cohen.

The creature was a string marionette and looked better in rapid cuts than the longer ones.

Another unused matte shot from the spider sequence.

I've always liked this Day matte, even though it never made the final cut of THIEF OF BAGDAD.  *Courtesy Susan Day

A different, higher quality frame from the same deleted matte shot.   *Courtesy Harrison Ellenshaw

Now this is an interesting shot I barely noticed in past viewings.  Sabu stumbles across a sort of mirage in the desert, from which an entire Bedouin encampment slowly appears.  The background is kind of washed out with luminence fall-off around the edges as all Technicolor rear projection work tended to be around the time.  Presumably two paintings lap dissolved over each other?   I don't know whether the desert view was a Percy Day rendering perhaps or that of a studio scenic painter?

An ingenious use of matte work here.  The flying carpet and it's physical wire rig above the set needed to have Percy Day 'fix' the shot so as to conceal the wire rig.   *Courtesy Susan Day

The magic carpet starts it's journey... with no evidence of the mechanical rig above the set.

Matted in top half of the tent.  Clever.

Back in the city... the carpet in full flight.  I think this was a physical wire-rigged gag for these views.  I wonder how hard it was to maintain balance for the actors?

Now, this sequence was really impressive.  The crowd gaze in awe as the carpet circles the minarets.  Now, what was really cool was the fact that the flying carpet casts a shadow on the building as it flies by.  Very neat indeed, and entirely practical.  The city of course was a foreground hanging miniature, and the carpet with occupants was an additional model, presumably 'flown' on wires to deliberately cast that shadow.  Really nice subtle touch and so convincing.

These shots were made in front of a blue screen and optically printed.

This page from Jim Danforth's indispensible memoir, Dinosaurs, Dragons & Drama, illustrates the general idea of the blue backing process.   *Courtesy of Jim Danforth

Probably Poppa Day's best shot in the film.  All of these Technicolor mattes were done as latent image shots - the standard technique employed by Day up until BLACK NARCISSUS around 1947 whereby the dupe process was the standard from that point on.  Day detailed some of the difficulties in shooting 3-Strip colour mattes on productions prior to switching to the duping method.  "One of the chief complications using latent was the 'build up' of the photographic latent image, resulting in a difference between the magenta, green and blue images after the first exposure, when the film was held before development.  When shooting the painting a different exposure was required for each of the 3-strip negatives, in order to obtain the same results as in the part already exposed.  As an example, in a scene in the film COLONEL BLIMP, a painting required to reproduce as 'grey' had to be made vivid green."

Rare before and after frames from Percy Day's original 35mm nitrate clips.   *Courtesy Susan Day

An excellent frame enlargement from the original 35mm print, which, as with most of the originals I have illustrated, look far better than the myriad video and tv incarnations, where colours are often skewed and hues 'all to buggery'.  I think there is still a place for the DEFINITIVE edition to be finally released.  Any takers out there?

The evil, and somewhat questionable Jaffar, played by the wonderful Conrad Veidt, figures it's time to, ahem,'cop a free feel'of our comely princess.  The forces of 'good' take exception to this, with little Sabu firing an arrow right between Jaffar's eyes!!!  An astonishingly graphic bit of 'Arabian Nights' violence which, when viewed, had me dumbfounded as to exactly how the physical effect was pulled off.  Hell, not even latter day ultra-violent movie classics like SOLDIER BLUE even managed to pull of a gag like this (we actually see the arrow strike and penetrate his forehead... no 'dummy' as the actor 'reacts'.  I know I've digressed again, but old school prosthetic and make up fx are a passion of mine.)

Sabu - our thief of the title - makes his way into the wild blue (screen) yonder, and goes on to appear in scores of other films, some most notable like BLACK NARCISSUS, until his untimely early death at just 39.   :(

THIEF OF BAGDAD was but one of 14 films nominated in the Best Special Effects category, 1940.  I've seen 12 of those pictures myself and could probably narrow the field down a bit, with excellent vfx shows like BOOM TOWN and REBECCA, though for me Fox's THE BLUE BIRD would be a very close candidate for winner, as the huge effects load in that film really was in a class of it's own, as detailed in a recent blog post, which may be read here.  I guess THIEF OF BAGDAD was worthy, though I'd like to have seen other technicians named along with Larry Butler, who actually took the award.

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THE THIEF OF BAGDAD: The original 1924 Douglas Fairbanks silent version

In my continuing efforts to leave 'no cinematic stone unturned', I've included the original 1924 version here as well.

Arguably the biggest star in Hollywood - the Tom Cruise of his day - Fairbanks was an international box office sensation and was instrumental in the creation of an independent film studio, United Artists, which he founded in partnership with Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford in the twenties.

The massive outdoor set mid construction for THIEF OF BAGDAD.

As extensive as the physical set was, other methods such as glass shots and hanging miniatures would still be needed to add to the grandeur.

One of several publicity pieces that appeared in print revealing the magic behind the film.

Production Designer was the legendary William Cameron Menzies, who, among other notable projects, would also be associate art director with Vincent Korda on the 1940 Technicolor version.

Special Photographic Effects man Phil Whitman (left) and associate art director Anton Grot (right).  Whitman was in charge of all of the glass shots and composite photography.  Ned Mann supervised the hanging miniatures, with assistance from a young Theodore Lydecker.

The picture was directed by one of the most versitile directors in the business, Raoul Walsh, who directed a number of my own favourite pictures such as WHITE HEAT, OBJECTIVE BURMA, THE BIG TRAIL, THEY DIED WITH THEIR BOOTS ON and THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT - all 'tough' and unapologetic films for their day.  He was pretty much the Samuel Fuller of his day.

I'm not sure whether this is a glass shot or a foreground hanging miniature?  Possibly the latter, as we see it several times with different 'time of day' lighting.

Same view, this one at night.  Characters act in the lower portion of the frame.

One of the large sets on the Fairbanks lot which has been extended even more through hanging miniatures by expert Ned Mann.  Mann was an extraordinary talent, and talent scout for that matter.  A number of later high profile trick shot exponents got their start through his training, such as Lawrence Butler, Cliff Richardson, Wally Veevers, Ross Jacklin, Eddie Cohen and others.

Miniature by Ned Mann.  Other films Mann supplied amazing trick shots for included the H.G Wells THINGS TO COME (1935); DELUGE (1933), and one very interesting and inventive show called THE BAT WHISPERS (1930), which had some eye-popping miniature set pieces in it.

Fairbanks on the prowl in what is either a foreground glass painted shot or a hanging miniature?

Enter the dragon.... Our athletic hero confronts a beast of volatile temperament.  According to a contemporary article, the effects team afixed fake horns to a crocodile and filmed it on a miniature set from a distance of some six feet.  Fairbanks was then photographed from around twenty feet away to diminish his scale.  The article states that"both were exposed on the same piece of film", though I would presume the Fairbanks footage to be shot against black and high contrast travelling mattes generated later to carefully time the action with the beast.

I'd suggest either the Dunning or the Frank Williams TM processes were utilised here.

I reckon that this sequence must have inspired Ray Harryhausen, as he did an almost exact duplicate of it in THE 3 WORLDS OF GULLIVER (1960), camera angles and all.

Now this sequence was quite beautiful.  The 'underwater' scene was done as an elaborate painted glass shot, supervised by Phil Whitman, and filmed 'dry'.  The apparently swaying kelp was moved with the aid of wires.

Another quite exquisite vfx sequence was the flying horse, upon which the Thief rides to the Citadel.  The Citadel was a miniature,  the horse and rider were filmed seperately against a black, velvet backing, while the clouds were painted on glass and moved slowly.

A beautifully designed and executed flight of fantasy.

Early travelling matte composite photography combining live action with glass painted clouds.

Miniature with foreground glass painted clouds.  Note the live action figures low in the frame.

The flying carpet takes to the skies...

Closer view of the magic carpet.  This shot was done in the studio (see below) against, what looks like, a painted scenic background.

A rare glimpse at the mechanical rig for the flying carpet.

Keeping one's balance must have been tricky.  Not at all one for heights myself.

Another wonderfully designed and photographed sequence with the flying horse.

Miniature setting with Fairbanks either 'added' in, or possibly filmed in situ akin to a Shufftan shot?

  The horse has been doubled in optically, and very smoothly too.

Do I smell a Steppenwolf song about to kick off.....

 

The show also features a couple of very nifty scenes involving what amounts to a sort of cloak of invisibility.  These shots were well done, involving double exposure dissolves, possibly made on the set, in camera.

A second 'invisibility' gag that worked a treat.  It was only with repeat rewinds that one can detect the very minor 'shift' among a couple of extras where it seems Douglas did his bit, everyone else 'froze in space' while he quickly exited the scene, and then the action carried on.  A nice lap dissolve 'takes him out' in the final scene.

The magic carpet stuns the locals.  Wire rigged from a huge construction crane with an 80 foot boom.  You still wouldn't get NZ Pete on the bloody thing!

Apparently, this not only impressed the film crew and cast, but blew the audiences away back in the day.  Done so well, with long, sweeping shots as the carpet glides and dives through Bagdad.

The wires are faintly visible here.

All miniature, including the carpet and riders.

Soundstage with wired rig and rolling painted backing.

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ATLANTIS-THE LOST CONTINENT:  Not at all among George Pal's better efforts.

This is one of those flicks we all loved as a kid, though looking at it in more recent times it's as hokey as they come.  The poster however was sensational - as most movie ad-art was in the sixties - and it was enough for me to buy a ticket.

Made in 1961, and packed to the brim with variable visual effects, though a great many of those were lifted shamelessly from other films, which was nothing new for George Pal.

Celebrated maker of many memorable fantasy films (this one arguably less so), George Pal, shown here shaking hands with MGM's very own in house wizard of countless productions, A.Arnold Gillespie.  *Courtesy Mr Gillespie's grandson, Robert Welch

Veteran MGM director of special effects, A.Arnold Gillespie - known to all and sundry as Buddy - is pictured here with visual effects cinematographer Clarence Slifer in what I suspect was Buddy's favourite haunt... the MGM tank on the backlot.  So much of Gillespie's remarkable career revolved around miniature ships (and aircraft) in this very tank.  Some of my all time 100% fx favourites were created by Buddy right here:  30 SECONDS OVER TOKYO;  GREEN DOLPHIN STREET;  MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY and on and on....  *Courtesy Robert Welch

An evocative lobby card that completely sold the flick to kids like moi.  I think I saw it on a double bill at the dire Astor theatre, here in Auckland on Dominion road (for any potential Kiwi readers out there, if in fact any exist??) - an absolute 'fleapit', famous for the chocolate ice cream stain on the right side of the screen.  Infamous also for the image gradually fading darker, and darker, and darker.... which, as it turned out from a recent conversation with a projectionist was due to that shady outfit using old 'carbon stubs'in the 35mm projectors, which would only last a while till they burnt out, and 'newer' carbon stubs (not a full carbon rod... they cost money!) would be inserted, and the image on the screen would magically become 'bright' again... at least till that fucken stub was reduced to ash!   Ah.... the bad old days!.... long before Xenon's, though, I digress, again.

As mentioned, many of the vfx shots in ATLANTIS were stolen from other films.  This severely cropped shot was originally a splendid CinemaScope matte shot from a fifties MGM epic with Lana Turner, THE PRODIGAL, as we can see above.

I reckon this too was lifted from another show, as no setting really resembles this in ATLANTIS.

Buddy Gillespie model shot.

A revealing look at the substantial outdoor tank set.  Note the 'wingless' airplanes mounted at the side to provide serious wind and storm effects for countless movies filmed here, such as BEN HUR, MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY, THE PLYMOUTH ADVENTURE and many more.  *Courtesy Robert Welch

I'm pretty sure this is a matte painted shot, as opposed to a tank with miniature & cyclorama backing.  Lee LeBlanc was in charge of the mattes.  Lee had a long career in the industry, starting off in the art department at Disney and then getting a job at 20th Century Fox in 1941.  Initially involved with miniatures he soon made his way into Fred Sersen's highly regarded matte department where he would stay for a number of years painting alongside artists such as Ray Kellogg, Emil Kosa, Jim Fetherolf and Matthew Yuricich until a prime opportunity arose over at MGM when Warren Newcombe retired in the late fifties.  LeBlanc, Yuricich and fx cameraman Clarence Slifer all went over to Metro, with Lee assuming head of that department. Lee would head that department until the early 1960's, from whence he retired to concentrate of wildlife artwork.  Many of LeBlanc's MGM mattes still survive with his family.

Under Lee, Matt Yuricich executed some of the mattes on ATLANTIS.

Oddly drawn out perspective here in this edge of your seat view down a canyon.

As I said, many mattes in ATLANTIS were pinched from other, often far more reputable productions, and this is another such example...

...and here's the original, glorious matte as painted in England by the legendary Peter Ellenshaw for the wonderful epic QUO VADIS (1951).  Note, the upper recycled shot has been slightly modified with a triangular pool thing matted into the foreground.

Before and after taken in Rome in 1950 for Mervyn LeRoy's QUO VADIS.  Don't believe any lying bastard who tries to sell you on the prospect that LeRoy stole the shot (and many others) from Pal.  As the 'comb-over orange man' says "That's fake news!"   ;)

An actual ATLANTIS matte shot, by all accounts.

Another shot shamelessly ripped off by Pal, and again, with a fresh slice of live action matted into the middle area on the steps...

A rare before and after from Ellenshaw's showreels, reveal the real deal...

....and again, we have the true provenance of the shot, another Peter Ellenshaw masterpiece from QUO VADIS - a film that not only never gave Peter his 'promised' screen credit (bastards!), but should have been an Oscar contender for the outstanding visual effects.  Some of Ellenshaw's best ever work.  Seriously!

Oh, and they just keep on coming, don't they.  Yet another pilfered matte!

Another rarely seen before and after that mysteriously appeared in ATLANTIS, horribly cropped and duped, but we all know different, don't we?

Yes folks, you guessed right... QUO VADIS from 1951, which was made in the UK and had Peter Ellenshaw rendering incredibly good matte paintings.  They should have given Peter a full screen credit on ATLANTIS, for Christs sake!

Large miniature on the MGM backlot, with what looks like painted cut-out city in the foreground.

The set up in the MGM tank, with the top of the huge painted cyclorama visible here.  *Courtesy Robert Welch

Huge landslide in ATLANTIS was another shot definitely borrowed from elsewhere....

...and here is the original miniature sequence as it was seen in the Stewart Granger adventure GREEN FIRE (1954).  In it's favour, Buddy Gillespie made this effects shot in the first place.

The volcanic eruption, with all of these cuts taken straight from George Pal's previous film, the wonderful THE TIME MACHINE (1960), which itself had shots in it from even earlier flicks!

Definitely taken from an older movie, though I can't place the title.

The mythical city of Atlantis is about to come crashing down in flames.  An admittedly well executed and shot sequence of events with much destruction and mayhem, all supervised by Buddy Gillespie and his very able team.

Dare I say it?  While these shots and most of the 'action' was shot for ATLANTIS, the many miniature structures were in fact old models that the great Donald Jahraus built for, yes, you guessed it, QUO VADIS.  They have evidentally been kept in safe storage for a decade and found a new use.

I well remember being utterly enthralled with this extended climatic sequence as a kid.

You just knew it was too good to be true.... more action and visual effects stolen (at gunpoint I ponder?) from QUO VADIS.  A remarkably well done flaming set piece, involving Donald Jahraus' miniature destruction and excellent optical compositing by Tom Howard.

More QV action that, as I mentioned, should have worked in favour of a Best Special Effects nomination, or even an outright win, for QUO VADIS.

Sick of hearing about QUO VADIS yet?   Well, this flaming vista of Rome going up in smoke was still another sequence from that famous epic.  Buddy Gillespie and Donald Jahraus supervised.  **Note:  The extended family of Mr Jahraus have been in contact with me and I'm dying to hear back from them, as Don was an absolute legend in the model business, and Gillespie regarded him as invaluable to the MGM fx operation.

The large MGM tank set prepped for destruction for ATLANTIS-THE LOST CONTINENT.

Mayhem in times of olde.

I found all of this very inspiring as a kid interested in 'trick shots'.

Everything was carefully pre-rigged with hidden spring activated cables and release devices timed to topple the pre-scored buildings on cue.

One of Gillespie's effects riggers in the ATLANTIS tank.  Joe Regan was what Gillespie termed a 'wave specialist', as many of Buddy's assistants had highly specific skills in certain areas such as: miniature trees-vegetation; scale pyrotechnics; model plane wire work; miniature process projection and so forth.  *Courtesy of Robert Welch.

All hell breaks loose in the luxury getaway resort that was Atlantis.

This all looked sensational on the big theatre screen, even though that happened to be the ice-cream stained, dingy screen at the Astor theatre here in Auckland!  Those were the days!  Young folk today have no idea how we enjoyed double, triple or quadruple bills back in the day.

I had an absolute fetish(!) for fx scenes with collapsing miniatures back in the day.  So many such scenes and flicks stay with me to this very day.

It worked so well shot in sunlight juxtaposed against the dark hued backing, which just added to the forboding sense of doom.

...and wouldn't you credit it.... the god-damned insurance policy expired just last week!

Just when the Atlantians figure things couldn't possibly get any worse, the whole damned thing explodes like the fucken' Death Star.

Splendid ad campaign, as was the norm in the day, and unsurprisingly promised somewhat more than it delivered.

***This vast and utterly exhaustive post, and all 186 previous blog posts known as 'Matte Shot', were originally created by Peter Cook for nzpetesmatteshot, with all content, layout and text originally published at http://nzpetesmatteshot.blogspot.com/ 

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FINAL WORD FOR 2024:

The world's outrage and anger just grows and grows, with the generously financed and militarily enabled genocide enthusiastically perpetrated by Israel upon the Palestinian and Lebanese populations.  TheState of Palestine alone has suffered more than 46'000 brutal and deliberate deaths at the hands and jackboots of the Zionist ultra-extremist regime, and their powerful foreign benefactor, and that count doesn't include the many, many thousands of Palestinian people (small children routinely included) targeted, assassinated, arrested and tortured on a regular basis for the past 80 years.

The malignant tumour that is Benjamin Netanyahu, is widely acknowledged by the United Nations and most world leaders -  with the courage to speak up - as a war criminal, as are his key partners in crime among his fascist government.  The deliberate and targeted ethnic cleansing by way of the planned maiming and destruction of women, children, medics, religious,  journalists, humanitarian workers, the sick, the infirmed and innocent civillians of The State of Palestine as well as Lebanon.  

Netanyahu, an 'off the leash'Zionist swine and his smirking 'holier-than-thou'bastard regime must be stopped.

STOP  SUPPLYING  ARMS  TO  ISRAEL  NOW!