A front projection effect is an
in-camera visual effects
Visual effects (sometimes abbreviated as VFX) is the process by which imagery is created or manipulated outside the context of
a live-action shot in filmmaking and video production.
The integration of live-action footage and other live-action fo ...
process in
film production
Filmmaking or film production is the process by which a Film, motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, beginning with an initial story, idea, or commission. Production then continues through screen ...
for combining foreground performance with pre-filmed background footage. In contrast to
rear projection, which projects footage onto a screen from behind the performers, front projection projects the pre-filmed material over the performers and onto a highly reflective background surface.
Description
In contrast to
rear projection, in front projection the background image is projected onto both the performer and a highly reflective background screen, with the result that the projected image is bounced off the screen and into the lens of a camera. This is achieved by having a screen made of a
retroreflective material such as
Scotchlite, a product of the
3M company that is also used to make screens for
movie theater
A movie theater (American English) or cinema (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English), also known as a movie house, cinema hall, picture house, picture theater, the movies, the pictures, or simply theater, is a business ...
s. Such material is made from millions of glass beads affixed to the surface of the cloth. These glass beads reflect light back only in the direction from which it came, far more efficiently than any common surface.
The actor (or subject) performs in front of the reflective screen with a
movie camera
A movie camera (also known as a film camera and cine-camera) is a type of photographic camera that rapidly takes a sequence of photographs, either onto film stock or an image sensor, in order to produce a moving image to display on a screen. In c ...
pointing straight at them. Just in front of the camera is a
one-way mirror angled at 45 degrees. At 90 degrees to the camera is a
projector
A projector or image projector is an optical device that projects an image (or moving images) onto a surface, commonly a projection screen. Most projectors create an image by shining a light through a small transparent lens, but some newer type ...
which projects an image of the background onto the mirror which reflects the image onto the performer and the highly reflective screen; the image is too faint to appear on the actor but shows up clearly on the screen. In this way, the actor becomes their own
matte. The combined image is transmitted through the mirror and recorded by the camera. The technique is shown and explained in the "making-of" documentary of the 1972 sci-fi film ''
Silent Running''.
Front projection was invented by
Will Jenkins. For this he holds , issued on December 20, 1955 for an "Apparatus for Production of Light Effects in Composite Photography" and , issued the same day for an "Apparatus for Production of Composite Photographic Effects."
It was first experimented with in 1949, shortly after the invention of Scotchlite, and had appeared in feature films by 1963, when the Japanese film ''
Matango'' used it extensively for its yacht scenes. Another early appearance was in 1966, during the filming of ''
2001: A Space Odyssey''. The actors in
ape suits were filmed on a stage at
Elstree Studios and combined with footage of
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...
(the effect is revealed in the
leopard
The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant cat species in the genus ''Panthera''. It has a pale yellowish to dark golden fur with dark spots grouped in rosettes. Its body is slender and muscular reaching a length of with a ...
's glowing eyes reflecting back the light).
Dennis Muren
Dennis Muren, A.S.C (born November 1, 1946) is an American film visual effects artist and supervisor. He has worked on the films of George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, and James Cameron, among others, and has won nine Oscars in total: eight for Bes ...
used a very similar solution for his 1967 debut film ''
Equinox
A solar equinox is a moment in time when the Sun appears directly above the equator, rather than to its north or south. On the day of the equinox, the Sun appears to rise directly east and set directly west. This occurs twice each year, arou ...
'', although Muren's technique didn't employ Scotchlite. Two British films released in 1969, ''
On Her Majesty's Secret Service'' and ''
The Assassination Bureau'', used the technique, as did the 1968 films ''
Barbarella'' and ''
Where Eagles Dare
''Where Eagles Dare'' is a 1968 action adventure war film directed by Brian G. Hutton and starring Richard Burton, Clint Eastwood and Mary Ure. Set during World War II, it follows a Special Operations Executive team charged with saving a ca ...
''.
Zoptic
Front projection was chosen as the main method for shooting
Christopher Reeve's flying scenes in ''
Superman
Superman is a superhero created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, which first appeared in the comic book ''Action Comics'' Action Comics 1, #1, published in the United States on April 18, 1938.The copyright date of ''Action Comics ...
''. However, they still faced the problem of having Reeve actually fly in front of the camera. Effects wizard Zoran Perisic patented a new refinement to front projection that involved placing a
zoom lens on both the
movie camera
A movie camera (also known as a film camera and cine-camera) is a type of photographic camera that rapidly takes a sequence of photographs, either onto film stock or an image sensor, in order to produce a moving image to display on a screen. In c ...
and the
projector
A projector or image projector is an optical device that projects an image (or moving images) onto a surface, commonly a projection screen. Most projectors create an image by shining a light through a small transparent lens, but some newer type ...
. These zoom lenses are synchronized to zoom in and out simultaneously in the same direction. As the projection lens zooms in, it projects a smaller image on the screen; the camera lens zooms in at the same time, and to the same degree, so that the projected image (the background plate) appears unchanged, as seen through the camera. However, the subject placed in front of the front projection screen ''appears'' to have moved closer to the camera; thus
Superman
Superman is a superhero created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, which first appeared in the comic book ''Action Comics'' Action Comics 1, #1, published in the United States on April 18, 1938.The copyright date of ''Action Comics ...
flies towards the camera. The technique is analogous to the more commonly discussed
dolly zoom
A dolly zoom (also known as a Hitchcock shot, ''Vertigo'' shot, ''Jaws'' effect,
or Zolly shot) is an in-camera effect that appears to undermine normal visual perception.
The effect is achieved by Zooming (filmmaking), zooming a zoom lens to a ...
effect.
Perisic called this technique "Zoptic". The process was also used in two of the
Superman
Superman is a superhero created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, which first appeared in the comic book ''Action Comics'' Action Comics 1, #1, published in the United States on April 18, 1938.The copyright date of ''Action Comics ...
sequels (but not used in the fourth movie due to budget constraints), ''
Return to Oz'', ''
Radio Flyer'', ''
High Road to China'', ''
Deal of the Century'', ''
Megaforce'', ''
Thief of Baghdad'', ''
Greatest American Hero'' (TV), as well as Perisic's films as
director, ''
Sky Bandits'' (also known as ''Gunbus'') and ''
The Phoenix and the Magic Carpet''.
Introvision
Introvision is a front projection composite photography system using a pair of perpendicular reflex screens to combine two projected scenes with a scene staged live before the camera in a single shot.
It allows foreground, midground and background elements to be combined in-camera: such as sandwiching stage action (such as actors) between two projected elements, foreground and background.
In its simplest form, images from a projector are directed at a beam splitter oriented at forty-five degrees. Two retro reflective screens are used, one to return the reflected image and one to return the pass through image. Set between the beam splitter and the retro reflective screens are mattes with cut outs that allow the projected image to strike each retro reflective screens in select areas. This combination, as seen by the camera, gives the appearance of images behind the actors (reflected image) and in front of the actors (pass through image). The camera sees the pass through image on the reverse side of the beam splitter and the reflected image through the beam splitter and combines the two eliminating the need for compositing in post production. To compensate for the large difference in the distance from the camera to the two screens an additional lens is used in the pass through image path.
The more complicated setup involves the use of two cameras, two projectors and multiple
beam-splitters, light traps, filters and aperture control systems. This setup provides the opportunity to use different content for foreground and background.
Introvision was first used in 1980–81 during the filming of the science-fiction movie ''
Outland'' to combine star
Sean Connery
Sir Thomas Sean Connery (25 August 1930 – 31 October 2020) was a Scottish actor. He was the first actor to Portrayal of James Bond in film, portray the fictional British secret agent James Bond (literary character), James Bond in motion pic ...
and other performers with models of the
Io mining colony. It was also used in the telefilm ''
Inside the Third Reich'' to place actors portraying Adolf Hitler and Albert Speer in the long-destroyed Reichstag, as well as ''
Under Siege
''Under Siege'' is a 1992 action thriller film directed by Andrew Davis and written by J. F. Lawton. It stars Steven Seagal (who also produced the film), Tommy Lee Jones, Gary Busey, and Erika Eleniak. Seagal plays Casey Ryback, a former ...
'', ''
Army of Darkness
''Army of Darkness'' is a 1992 American dark fantasy comedy film directed, co-written, and co-edited by Sam Raimi. The film is the third installment in the Evil Dead, ''Evil Dead'' film series and the sequel to ''Evil Dead II'' (1987). Starring ...
'' and ''
The Fugitive'', where it seemed to place
Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford (born July 13, 1942) is an American actor. Regarded as a cinematic cultural icon, he has starred in Harrison Ford filmography, many notable films over seven decades, and is one of List of highest-grossing actors, the highest-gr ...
on top of a bus that was then rammed by a train. ''
Adventures in Babysitting'' employed IntroVision to place children in multiple situations of peril such as hanging from the rafters and scaling the "
Smurfit-Stone Building" in Chicago, and ''
Stand By Me'' used IntroVision during the train sequence.
Most movie companies brought small units to the Introvision sound stages near Poinsettia and Santa Monica Boulevard in Hollywood, California. Scenes were often shot near the end of the production schedule to allow for the shooting of "live" plates to have been done while on location.
Front projection versus other techniques
Compared to
back projection, the front projection process used less studio space, and generally produced sharper and more saturated images, as the background plate was not being viewed through a projection screen. The process also had several advantages over
bluescreen matte photography, which could suffer from clipping, mismatched mattes, film shrinkage, black or blue haloing, garbage matte artifacts, and image degradation/excessive grain. It could be less time-consuming, and therefore less expensive, than the process of optically separating and combining the background and foreground images using an
optical printer
An optical printer is a device consisting of one or more film projectors mechanically linked to a movie camera. It allows filmmakers to re-photograph one or more strips of film. The optical printer is used for making visual effects for motion p ...
. It also allowed the director and/or director of photography to view the combined sequence live, allowing for such effects to be filmed more like a regular sequence, and the performers could be specifically directed to time their actions to action or movement on the projected images.
However, advancements in
digital compositing
Digital compositing is the process of digitally assembling multiple images to make a final image, typically for print, motion pictures or screen display. It is the digital analogue of optical film compositing. It's part of VFX processing.
Ma ...
and the increasing use of digital cameras have made digital the most common method of choice. The last major
blockbuster to extensively use front projection was the
Sylvester Stallone
Sylvester Gardenzio "Sly" Stallone (; born July 6, 1946) is an American actor and filmmaker. In a Sylvester Stallone filmography, film career spanning more than fifty years, Stallone has received List of awards and nominations received by Syl ...
action thriller
The action film is a film genre that predominantly features chase sequences, fights, shootouts, explosions, and stunt work. The specifics of what constitutes an action film has been in scholarly debate since the 1980s. While some scholars such as D ...
''
Cliffhanger
A cliffhanger or cliffhanger ending is a plot device in fiction which features a main character in a precarious situation, facing a difficult dilemma or confronted with a shocking revelation at the end of an episode of serialized fiction or bef ...
'' from
1993
The United Nations General Assembly, General Assembly of the United Nations designated 1993 as:
* International Year for the World's Indigenous People
The year 1993 in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands had only 364 days, since its ...
. More recently, the film ''
Oblivion'' made extensive use of front projection (though not retro-reflective) to display various sky backgrounds in the home set. ''
Spectre'' also used this technique for its snow mountain hospital and glass building interiors. The advantages for the in-camera effect were a reduced need for digital effects and green screen, interactive lighting in a reflective set, and to provide a real background for the actors.
See also
*
Film production
Filmmaking or film production is the process by which a Film, motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, beginning with an initial story, idea, or commission. Production then continues through screen ...
*
Pepper's ghost
Citations
General sources
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Front Projection Effect
Film production
In-camera visual effects