This is one of three other production documentaries included on the two-disc DVD of Troy, and it tells some interesting footage about how some of the special effects were done and how they were edited together. My favorite is how they talk about how a shot of the Greek soldiers storming across the beach toward Troy was filmed on a beach in Mexico while the shot of them entering the city was filmed in Malta, on the other side of the world. Both shots were filmed on a cable (another interesting technique explained here) and edited together into a single shot. So without even cutting, a smooth tracking shot switches locations thousands of miles apart and is perfectly smooth. I love that.
One of the guys on the special effects crew also talks about how they took out about 60% of the ships that appeared in the trailer for the film because it just looked too crowded, they were sailing too close together, taking each other's wind, etc. That's a pretty interesting story, I just found it a bit odd because the shot they refer to is not in the theatrical trailer included with the DVD. Maybe they took them out of the theatrical trailer, too.
But the thing that I found most impressive was that they wrote their own software for creating many of the special effects shots in the movie because there wasn't really any software available on the market that could accomplish everything that they wanted to do. There was an incredible amount of work put into making people believe that they were looking at history and not at a movie, and in my opinion it was with much success. The video also includes an interesting segment on the sound effects in the movie, which are always interesting. See, for example, the segments on sound effects in the making-of Indiana Jones documentaries. That's the kind of thing that makes me want to learn more about how sound is done in movies!
Overall it's a good show, but the editing again is jolting, there is quite often not enough time allowed for you to get a good look at the sets and locations. There's nothing worse than a behind-the-scenes documentary that doesn't allow you enough time to get a look behind the scenes before cutting to something else. Luckily the information revealed in the video is still very interesting.
My biggest gripe is that, over all three of the documentaries included on the supplemental DVD that comes with the movie, there is all of a single, solitary line included from an interview with Peter O'Toole, by far the biggest actor involved with the film. Disappointing, to say the least.
One of the guys on the special effects crew also talks about how they took out about 60% of the ships that appeared in the trailer for the film because it just looked too crowded, they were sailing too close together, taking each other's wind, etc. That's a pretty interesting story, I just found it a bit odd because the shot they refer to is not in the theatrical trailer included with the DVD. Maybe they took them out of the theatrical trailer, too.
But the thing that I found most impressive was that they wrote their own software for creating many of the special effects shots in the movie because there wasn't really any software available on the market that could accomplish everything that they wanted to do. There was an incredible amount of work put into making people believe that they were looking at history and not at a movie, and in my opinion it was with much success. The video also includes an interesting segment on the sound effects in the movie, which are always interesting. See, for example, the segments on sound effects in the making-of Indiana Jones documentaries. That's the kind of thing that makes me want to learn more about how sound is done in movies!
Overall it's a good show, but the editing again is jolting, there is quite often not enough time allowed for you to get a good look at the sets and locations. There's nothing worse than a behind-the-scenes documentary that doesn't allow you enough time to get a look behind the scenes before cutting to something else. Luckily the information revealed in the video is still very interesting.
My biggest gripe is that, over all three of the documentaries included on the supplemental DVD that comes with the movie, there is all of a single, solitary line included from an interview with Peter O'Toole, by far the biggest actor involved with the film. Disappointing, to say the least.
