Category: Special Effects & Props

The Stan Winston School of Character Arts recently put up a collection of behind-the-scenes photos and recollections from the crew responsible for building the titular monsters of The Monster Squad, including The Wolfman portrayed by Jonathan Gries.

“The challenge was to suggest those classic creatures, without really copying them,” explained  [lead mummy builder] Shane Mahan, “because we didn’t have permission or the license to use those specific images. So we could do a ‘Gillman’, for example, but it couldn’t look too much like the Creature from the Black Lagoon. It was frustrating for us at first, because, of course, we wanted to do the original designs! But we couldn’t. We could only suggest those designs.”

This isn’t a Monster Legacy level essay, but there’s some neat stuff on display, including Stan Winston’s original sketch of the Wolfman. Yep, you can thank him for those super wide-set eyes.

I want to show the pain. I want him to be able to move around, he’s gonna pull his clothes off, we’re gonna see the whole body change — so figure out how to do that.

– John Landis describing the AWIL transformation to Rick Baker

John Landis’s An American Werewolf in London is 35 years old this week, and its showcase werewolf transformation scene is still regarded by werewolf fans as the best ever shown on film. Leave it to the invaluable and tireless minds of Monster Legacy to write a 4,000-word essay on the concept, design, planning and execution of that transformation scene, and then support that essay with an enormous photo gallery.

If you want to immerse yourself in monster makeup and costumes but you can’t get a job in the creature effects industry, reading Monster Legacy might be the next best thing. Last year they provided wonderful photo-essays on the werewolf in The Cabin in the Woods and the Lycans of the Underworld series. Now they’ve posted an incredibly thorough exploration of the design and execution of the werewolves in The Howling.

Rob Bottin and his crew brought the werewolves of the Colony to life through an ambitious process of iteration and experimentation, but as the article explains, Bottin was unsure whether the work was any good or not even as the finished shots were being edited together. I was particularly interested to learn about Rick Baker’s role, which went from “designer” to “advisor” as he realized his work on The Howling might conflict with his commitment to An American Werewolf in London.

This passage stood out to me as an excellent summary of why I feel bored and a little cheated whenever I see actual wolves uses to portray werewolves in film and TV.

In adapting the story, [director Joe] Dante also rejected the Studio’s proposals “to use large wolves” to portray the antagonist creatures — an approach Dante “always found disappointing” in other films of the genre. “It’s very hard to even find actors who can look natural while filming a scene with an animal,” Dante explained, “and it takes tremendous time and patience waiting for the animal to do the right thing. And that’s just for normal rabid wolves footage — nothing supernatural at all. Real wolves aren’t scary; it brings things down to nature, really robs things of any fantasy value.” The director was, in fact, adamant in the intention to portray Werewolves as beastly humanoid creatures in his film — nightmare stalkers.

If it wasn’t 9 o’clock on a Monday morning, I would drink to that!

Read the full essay on Monster Legacy, and then check out the accompanying gallery of behind-the-scenes photos and production stills from The Howling. Thanks to Monster Legacy for their always-excellent work!

I got a follow-up email from Hair of the Dog director Michael Butts the other day.

Just wanted to share this picture of the “werewolf” in “Hair of the Dog.” Bennett Rodgers spent 6 hours in make-up which went from head to toe. This of course is just a shot of Bennett’s face in full werewolf make-up.

Scott Crain took the picture[,] and the make up artists were Stacy Lockhart, Caleb Paschall, and Laura Natalie Homer.

I was pleasantly surprised to learn the werewolves in this movie have a form more lupine than the wolfman-esque visuals we’ve already seen (and that I was quite happy with).

The big-screen adaptation of the Goosebumps book series is crammed with as many of R.L. Stine’s monsters as will fit. Via SOLIDASP comes a link to a Cinefex Q&A / interview with MPC production VFX supervisor Erik Nordby and VFX producer Greg Baxter, the two guys in charge of bringing these creatures to life.

In a somewhat dry but interesting discussion, Nordby and Baxter discuss the challenges of creating the Ginormous Blob, the Abominable Snowman, and of course the beloved (by me) Werewolf of Fever Swamp.

Let’s look at one of the creatures in more detail – the Werewolf, for instance?

GREG BAXTER: The initial 2D concept design for the Werewolf was provided by Carlos Huantes. Carlos then built a miniature maquette which we cyberscanned via 3DS in Burbank. This was our initial starting point for MPC to model and augment from.

VFX people, help me out – is “cyberscanned” a term of art, or is Baxter from a CSI Miami episode?

Who performed the Werewolf on set?

GREG BAXTER: John Bernecker was our stunt proxy for the Werewolf. He performed on-camera for just about every Werewolf shot, including running on all-fours atop a grocery store freezer. Erik and MPC Supervisor Pete Dionne built a custom facial capture rig with Go-Pros and a bicycle helmet, capturing John’s snarling for additional animation reference.

Interesting to hear that despite the heavy use of CG, on-set proxies and performers were essential in creating the film’s monsters.

For more on the process, including a wonderful dig at my favourite thing to complain about regarding werewolf morphology, check out the post on Cinefex.