A Close Encounters Example of Forced Perspective Trailers From HellClose Encounters awareness is up this week, what with a national mini release of the 1. Steven Spielberg hit, so I reached into the bottomless Savant archives for something to show and tell. This might be educational for fans of old school visual effects, in this case, the miniature making genius of Gregory Jein. The miniature shop at the Marina Del Rey effects facility for Close Encounters of the Third Kind was full of surprises. Miniature specialist propmaker Gregory Jein had help at times from several modelmakers, mainly Ken Swenson and Michael Mc. Millen. But a great many of the tabletop miniatures for the flying saucer epic were built primarily by Greg alone. He carved the Devils Tower mountain and constructed several other landscapes on plywood tables about ten feet in length. The most complex miniature was not a full model, but a reflections model of an auto toll booth, in which Director of Photography of Special Effects Richard Yuricich was tasked with adding the effects of a glowing saucer flying through. On a shoot in San Pedro, Steven Spielberg suddenly decided he wanted a new shot, and had Yuricich line up his 6. Cult Horror Movies Loud House Movie on this page. The shot wasnt in the schedule or the budget, which didnt please Columbia production head John Veitch. Yuricich had to brainstorm to figure a way to do the shot for next to nothing, and the solution came to him on his drive home. All Gregory Jein had to work with was a clip of a 6. He painstakingly constructed little panes of glass in depth, aligned so that when double exposed onto the existing shot, reflections would be added of the passing flying saucer the glowing red Tinkerbell dot as it chased the highway patrolmen Hey, thats Ohio. It costs a quarter. Richard Yuricich lined up the shot, and I assisted Greg in plotting it out mainly, I held up little pieces of plastic while he directed me through the viewfinder, as if I were a surveyors assistant. The model ended up being this little set of boxes and windows. It worked amazingly well. Storyboards called out for a wide shots of the crossroads where Power Company employee Roy Neary runs into his first saucers, glowing hot rods that are apparently in love with our road system. Spielberg wanted a night for night look where one could see to the horizon, which meant that the shot couldnt be made in a real location. Bright lights from the saucers were meant to blast down on the road, throw shadows, etc. Volume 19, Number 11. Contents Under Pressure. At some point in our past, we have all been advised to refrain from shaking and then opening containers filled with. Is Whiplash actor Miles Teller really playing the drums in Damien Chazelles jazz drama Mikes Movie Mailbag. As only one angle was needed, Greg Jein was able to solve the problem with a Forced Perspective tabletop miniature. Quietly, on his own and using photos from the location, Greg built this oddly shaped intersection. The first photo, with editor Larry Robinson checking out the tabletop model, was taken from above, to show the extreme compression in the vanishing point, with the supposedly one hundred foot section of road distorted to a broad triangle. The sideways running road is a ribbon, and the fields and additional roads beyond are foreshortened and crammed into less than 15 the width of the table. Note that the camera is on the left, shooting at the funnel shaped roadway. You can just see the round 6. That cameras view is the angle shown in the second photo, below. Photo Copyright 1. Find your favorite Disney movies available now or preorder on Bluray disc, DVD, and download to watch any time. Glenn Erickson. In the second image, note the decreasing size of the telephone poles, the detail in the asphalt surface, the ditch, the furrowed crop on the left, and the tiny farm implements and trees in the background. Note the two stop signs they look distant from each other in the photo below, but in the top photo they are revealed to be only inches apart. One is only 13 as big as the other. I believe that in the movie there are no moving shots on this miniature one could move the camera a little bit, but not much. The tabletop model was much wider than what we see in this second view, which gave the cameramen more latitude for framing in 6. It seemed to take almost a year to get the Close Encounters visual effects factory up and running, to churn out flying saucer shots. But this miniature and several more were always in the back room as an inspiration for what was to come. In the photo below, the background sky is just the brick wall of the former egg factory that was the effects facility. Photo Copyright 1. Glenn Erickson. I would later help Gregory Jein get a much larger miniatures effort going for 1. North Hollywood and shared with A. D. Flowers physical effects crew. On Close Encounters things went much more slowly, as Greg completed his impressive artwork piece by piece, before he turned his attention to the mothership. The effects shop was unionnonunion in an odd way, which mainly meant that they could be sneaky and let a non union clerkrunnerfetchit person me work the editing library, project 7. Gregory. I also took some of the only photos of the special effects work, and was able to keep a few pictures any black white photos you see of flying saucers being filmed in smoke rooms, etc., are probably mine. It was the most fun of any job I ever had Doug Trumbulls shop was closely associated with the facility out in The Valley inventing the wild Star Wars effects, so I had the illusion of being in on that historical production as well. Had I wanted to be a cameraman like Hoyt Yeatman, project supervisor Richard Yuricich would have helped me. My interest was in editorial, and the editor in charge of effects wasnt as generous. So it was a full twelve years before I was able to apply to the Editors Guild. About Glenn Erickson. Glenn Erickson left a small town for UCLA film school, where his spooky student movie about a haunted window landed him a job on the CLOSE. A look at the relationship between Mike and Sulley during their days at the University of Fear when they werent necessarily the best of friends. The. Fran Ryan, Actress General Hospital. As an American character actress, Fran Ryan was a familiar face on stage, screen and television from her theatrical stage debut. Toy Story 2 is a 1999 American computeranimated comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. Directed by John Lasseter and codirected. Mike`S New Car Movie Trailers' title='Mike`S New Car Movie Trailers' />The situation for newcomers is much better now. Glenn Erickson, 90. Richard Yuricich and Robert Hollister lining up the crossroads miniature. Gregory Jein is just visible on the lower left. Photo Copyright 1. Glenn Erickson. Visit DVD Savants Main Column Page. Glenn Erickson answers most reader mail dvdsavantmindspring. Text Copyright 2. Is Whiplash actor Miles Teller really playing the drums in Damien Chazelles jazz drama Mikes Movie Mailbag.