Customer Reviews

Special Effects: An Oral History--Interviews with 37 Masters Spanning 100 Years

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

If you like special effects, you'll have a blast reading this book which was obviously written to please movie fans of all ages. A previous review onAmazon said "good, but not the best" and went on praising another book,which is in fact a very technical reference book for special effects pros or film students. I think it is a bit unfair to criticize a book because it is different from what you expected. "Special effects: an oral history" is not a dictionary. It is entertaining and fun to read precisely because it is not a boring catalog of techniques, props and apparatus. It manages to tell the history of special effects as a human adventure, involving many wonderful artists and also explain clearly how they've created miracles in movies, animated feature films or in TV series and theme parks rides (special chapters devoted to animation, makeup, television and theme parks effects, are each over 100 pages long, which is great, since all other FX books I've read so far are devoted to movies only) . Famous special effects geniuses like Ray Harryhausen, Stan Winston, John Dykstra, John Lasseter (and many others) tell great anecdotes about their work and about their creativity. You can buy this book, you won't be disappointed and your kids will love it from the first page to the end! And the 1500 photos and illustrations are simply stunning!

Anyone even slighty interested in this subject will like this book - end of story. From Stan Winstons 'Terminator' to Nimba Creations full size animatronic Tyrannosaurus Rex, this is a cracking book filled with great photos that is the best of it's type.

It covers everything from the beginning of filmmaking right up to present day and leaves nothing out, hence the vast 600 page count; this thing is thicker than a phone book!!

No complaints, it's a wonderful piece of work.

As a charter subscriber to Cinefex magazine, the 25-year industry bible for visual effects, I'm no stranger to this topic. But flipping through Pinteau's book yielded some exciting revelations and mostly, It did not disappoint. The book promises interviews with masters "spanning 100 years" although it skews pretty heavily to the past decade (not a surprise). But I bought it for the pictures and they made it worth the time and money. The pics are well-chosen and even familiar old films are illustrated with scenes seen less often. I also like the durable hard/soft cover---because I'll be picking this one up frequently.

I picked this up of $4.95 on the close out racks at Border's, and it's certainly worth that money. Interesting interviews and great photos, tons of them. Sadly there is only a very vague content page and no index at all, which is a serious mistake in such a book. It's impossible to find any movie or person other than paging through the entire book.

Maybe mine was a misprint or something (hence the cheap price?) but how one can create a phonebook size work like this and not add a movie and person index is a bit baffling. A more detailed content at least would be nice to have.

A great read, but if you want to come back to something you better make notes or put flags in the book.

Yes, it's finally happened. A skilled author has taken the time to contact the best FX artists in the world and compile the most comprehensive collection of stories, interviews and photographs ever published. Every major FX film gets a mention in this book, and there are 'behind the scenes' photos you will never have seen before which gives this book a real feeling of being a benchmark for literature on the subject. Whether you want to be a special effects artist or you're one already, I GUARANTEE you will not be disappointed by this high quality publication - congratulations Mr. Pinteau and thank you for compiling a book that will grace shelves for years to come.

I liked this book a lot. The best thing about it is the pictures, they are well researched and some are quite rare. Unfortunately the text does not live up to the quality of the images and the book's sumptuous feel. The author attempts to explain how techniques work, often relying on interviews with experts who often say WHAT they did but not really HOW. Unfortunately this often leads to slightly baffling and incomplete explanations. I dont think it helps that it has been translated from French. If you want to read about how effects are achieved with REALLY CLEAR EXPLANATIONS and helpful diagrams you still can't beat Richard Rickitt's book 'Special Effects: The History and Technique' which is a real class act- I recommend it to all my FX students. But this book comes a close second (though I did find one or two factual errors). It has some unusual examples and it's interesting to see some of the stuff about TV and theme park effects.

A fantastic collection of pieces by different people inside the effects industry that is the next best thing to getting to interview them yourselves PLUS lots of photos I've never seen anywhere else.

This book was worth every penny! All the greats have been intervued, and there are interesting and fun facts all over! I have had loads of smiles, laughs and serious thoughts from this book!

That was cool journey to the world of Cinematography! All this stuff was new to me and still is. Me - I myself study, learn 3D animations, but reading this book found that in Cinematography's world there a lot more things that I found amazing. This book definitely gave me huge portion of inspiration. Now I take a totally different view to movies and animations, especially old school 2D.

The book covers the subject very well, but has a number of minor errors. Sometimes they are represented as quotes by someone who would obviously know better. Example - it has stopmotion animator Phil Tippet saying you remove the surface gauge, then move the puppet, then put it back in the same place to measure the move, which I very much doubt he said. (You leave the gauge there while you move the puppet so you can see how far you moved, then remove it to take the shot.) Other technical processes are not clearly explained, and may also be wrong - I'm not expert enough to be certain with all of them.
There are occasional signs of a literal translation from the French - pate a modelier (plasticine or modelling clay) is not called "modelling paste" in English - but it presents no problems. On the up side, it includes the work of some French and other European effects artists that have been overlooked in most American books on the subject.
It goes into all the different areas of special effects in separate sections, although obviously there is a good deal of overlap between fields like makeup effects and animatronics. Despite minor flaws, I'm very glad to have bought this book - it does add a lot that is not in other books.