Industrial Light & Magic: Into the Digital Realm (Hardcover)

~ (Author), Patricia Rose Duignan (Collaborator) "In ILM's Building C entranceway stands an Egyptian sarcophagus, its masklike face set with an inscrutable smile, the trunk riddled with hieroglyphics..." (more)
Key Phrases: pyro work, rotoscope camera, holdout matte, Star Trek, Jurassic Park, George Lucas (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This 330-page coffee-table book combines the writing of Mark Cotta Vaz and Patricia Rose Duignan with more than 600 photographs and illustrations to chronicle the accomplishments of Hollywood's hottest special effects company. Industrial Light & Magic, where Duignan spent two decades of her career, was founded by George Lucas to create the effects for his groundbreaking movie, Star Wars. Since then ILM has continued to pioneer new technologies which have led to SF classics such as "E.T.," "Terminator 2" and "Jurassic Park". This books offers a behind-the-scenes look into the magical moments ILM has helped create.

Product Description

Includes a foreword by Steven Spielberg!

The supernatural wonders of Ghostbusters. The lively three-dimensional toons from Who Framed Roger Rabbit? The unstoppable liquid-metal T-1000 cyborg of Terminator 2. The incredibly life-like digital dinosaurs of Jurassic Park. The thunderous African stampede in Jumanji. These award-winning special effects have one thing in common: Industrial Light & Magic (ILM).

For more than twenty years, George Lucas and the technical wizards at ILM have literally changed the face of movie-making with their stunning, often unbelievable, visual effects. Industrial Light + Magic: Into the Digital Realm chronicles ILM's second monumental decade--from 1986 through the mid-nineties--and includes a special discussion on the latest groundbreaking visual effects in the soon-to-be released Special Edition of Star Wars: A New Hope.

During this seminal period, ILM virtually redefined visual effects and blazed a trail into the digital realm. With more than six hundred lavish full-color photographs, this fascinating book takes you behind the camera and into the rarely seen workshops, offering an amazing look at the men and women who create movie magic. We follow the intricate crafts of matte painting, model making, and optical compositing as they are transformed into digitally driven systems, and we track the contributions of model and creature makers, animation specialists and optical technicians, and the unsung stage hands and pyrotechnic experts.

Packed with astounding information about ILM's technical innovations and remarkably clear explanations--including a revealing look at ILM's work with TV commercials and theme park attractions, a comprehensive glossary of essential terms, and detailed screen credits for all the company's film projects--this volume will enchant and enlighten all of us who have ever marveled at what we've seen on the screen and wondered: how did they do that?

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 328 pages
• Publisher: Del Rey; 1st edition (October 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345381521
• ISBN-13: 978-0345381521
• Product Dimensions: 12.4 x 10.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #329,670 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book. Huge, but great., October 23, 1998

By A Customer

If you know about visual effects, you know about ILM. And this book describes their work over the last ten years in great detail. The illustrations are superb, and the pullouts are simply spectacular. If i do have one gripe, it is the fact that they really don't go into the real process of the digital effects. They do to a point, but since i work with these type of programs, i would like to see how the masters do it.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Future of the Magic, June 15, 2000

By	Mark Hills "Nobody gets me, I'm the wind, baby!" (Ottawa, Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

For 25 years Industrial Light and Magic has woven magic into countless films, either subtle images through `invisible' effects such as matte paintings or through eye-popping visuals that stand out vividly against the film backdrop. ILM has made it's mark on history, for not only have they been and still are the premiere effects house in Hollywood, they have innovated and invented more technology than any other studio, additionally they have won awards for the processing and compositing technology they have created. ILM had to be the best at special effects, because their flagship title - STAR WARS - demanded the best, because that's what Lucas wanted.

`Into the Digital Realm' isn't so much an abandonment of ILM of the traditional methods of special effects, rather a point of departure for the new technology and all of things that led up to it. Indeed, ILM's work on `The Hunt For Red October' submarine work involved flying the submerged vessels from wires in a smoky room - effects do not get any more traditional than that. Released in 96, the book doesn't mention that Phantom Menace or even that the film is in production. It does have some revised images from the Star Wars special edition. As with the previous tome, this one is packed with hundreds of color photos, plus the same beautiful gate fold images.

If the center piece for the previous book was Star Wars, Digital Realms' focus is obviously Jurassic Park, because it was the first film to use CG on so large a scale, even more than Terminator 2, which ILM also did. Jurassic Park was also the test bed and showcase piece that convinced Lucas that computers had finally matured enough to bring what he had in mind to the screen for the new Star Wars films. More is the pity, because I came to loathe most of the aliens in the Phantom Menace. Digital Realm clearly explains in easy to understand terms how effects - both new and old - are accomplished, be it something as simple as making it appear as if buildings are actually much taller than they or having a velociraptor walk _behind_ a plant situated in the foreground. I have both of these wonderful books, and I strongly recommend them to anyone who is curious about ILM's history and the process of how effects are made.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic!, June 17, 2005

By	A. Ross "indy31" (New Zealand) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

One of the greatest 'making of' writers Patricia Rose Duignan's Industrial Light & Magic: Into the Digital Realm is one of my all-time favorite books, charting the journey of ILM from fledgling company in George Lucas' garage to the No.1 Special Effects company in the world. Insightful and comprehensive, this is flawless reading and has some great accompanying images from Star Wars, Indiana Jones, and surprisingly some of their lesser-known movies like Willow and Hook. An essential movie book, I just love every page, so carefully written, so rich in detail, it leaves the reader feeling that they have experienced something very special. Fantastic and brilliant. BUY IT NOW!