Milestones In Visual Effects: What Came Before Star Wars

Since the Star Wars we have seen many wonders on the big screen. But what happened before?

Ever since the very first moving picture, Star Wars special effects have amazed the audience. Over time, they have grown from the early basic tricks to computer spectacles. We witness the magic of various advanced techniques like stop-motion and performance capture on the screen almost every day. But where did it all begin? That is what we aim to bring out here.

Movies That Set The Foundation To The Best Visual Effects Of Today

1. The Lost World: 1925

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The Lost World established a new genre of movies of feature length dinosaur oriented sci-fi movies. Following the creation of the life sized giants in this movie many followed like Gojira, Jurassic Park and Godzilla. Wills O’Brian pioneered the first use of the primitive stop motion animation, especially in the scene where the brontosaurus knocking down people with its tail on the streets of London.

2. King Kong: 1933

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Wills O’Brian’s masterful use of detailed stop-motion animation and the best visual effects on King Kong and the dinosaurs makes this movie still one of the best effects ever created. King Kong also employed a combination of matte paintings, miniatures, rear projection, and stop-motion through many different scenes to create a more realistic effect.

3. Snow White And The Seven dwarfs: 1937

Credits: cartoonpapers.com

Snow white and the seven dwarfs was the ground breaking 83 minute film that was built on hand drawn animation entirely. It was the first ever movie to use rotoscopy for the entire length of the feature.

4. The Wizard Of Oz: 1939

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The Wizard of Oz made considerable use of matte painting projections to make the audience believe the actors where in a different location all together. But the best visual effects from the 3 different angles on the twister takes the cake and the cherry on it!

5. Fantasia: 1940

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Fantasia was the first artistic animation movie with classical music. This was also the first film ever to use a multi-channel stereo sound called fantasound.

6. Citizen Kane: 1941

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This master piece from Orson Welles used a combination of cinematic and narrative techniques with experimental innovations to create the title character like putting such as putting together puzzle pieces

7. The Ten commandments: 1956

Credits: tmbd.org

When the red sea parted, our jaws dropped! This scene is till date one of the most miraculous and expensive scenes in the making of visual effects. Some of the other scenes in the movie that used special effects are the burning bushes and different plagues. Compositing was also used to multiply the number of extras in the scene.

8. 2001: A Space odyssey: 1968

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The Star Gate and Star Child sequence, along with other special effects, helped create this movie, which later pioneered several such films in this genre. This was the first movie to have such a realistic image of space. Miniature models of spacecraft, timer or manually guided pre-motion control cameras, rear projection, full-sized props or models, and other early techniques were used.

9. A Clockwork Orange: 1971

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A Clockwork Orange was the first movie to use Dolby technology to record sound. A technology that has now become a staple.

10. The Exorcist: 1973

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The Exorcist, a horrifying story of a girl possessed by the devil and later the exorcism was a result of some really stunning effects. A lot of the nauseating scenes like the appearance of the words “HELP ME” on the girl’s stomach and also the 360 degree head rotation could not be done without the more basic technology and the ingenuity of the team.

These 10 wonders paved the way to the development in technology of best visual effects that started a revolution in the form of Star Wars and eventually led to the making of Gravity!

Utkarsh Salunkhe

Last updated: October 4, 2024

Utkarsh was honored with the 7th Dadasaheb Phalke film award for his short film "Grey," and presently, he is working on post-production of a Trilogy feature film project called 'SHADES' for which he is responsible as a Writer, Director, Editor and Art Director.