[Music]
for motion-capture to virtual production
Disney has been able to bring everything
from the pride lands to Agrabah into the
real world but trying to translate these
classics from hand-drawn animation to
live-action while maintaining everything
audiences loved about the originals is
never easy like how do you make a photo
realistic lion that can also belt out
songs to see how they did it take a peek
at what eight Disney live-action remakes
look like behind the scenes actress Lee
you you say
trained for three months about six to
seven hours per day to portray Mulan
like here where you can see her
preparing for one of the movie's epic
sword fights
according to cinematographer Mandy
Walker the actress did about 90% of her
own stunts the cast had to learn
everything from martial arts to
horseback riding for the action-packed
film meanwhile many of the film's
gravity defying stunts were achieved
with impressive wire work this film
featured about 70 different animal
species created using groundbreaking CGI
there was a key step in the process to
making sure all of the animals looked so
realistic facial rigging during this
stage animators explored what muscles
animals have that humans do not by doing
that they can ensure the animals would
do things like snarl the right way to
make sure the animals look convincing
when they talked animators used a
combination of human and animal muscles
for the characters mouths another
crucial breakthrough had to do with
putting hairs on the animals they had to
figure out the direction and animals
hair would move how it clumps and how it
interacts with the world around it
perhaps most impressive is that Neel
Sethi who played Mowgli acted completely
alone
as all the animals were created with CGI
and the other stars recorded their
voices but he did have a little company
actors and blue suits and crew members
held up animal puppets and used googly
eyes on their hands like these pesky
monkeys that steal food for Mowgli
which were later replaced with CGI
versions of the animals The Jungle Book
paved the way for 20 19's The Lion King
the film was shot using virtual
production which allowed director Jon
Favreau and the crew to step into the
world they were creating and shoot
everything like it was really
live-action the biggest challenge for
the film's visual effects team was
creating a photorealistic version of the
African savannah while also remaining
faithful to the source material take the
part where Rafiki stands and lifts Simba
in reality mandrels can't stand up like
that so in the new version they animated
the character sitting down while lifting
Simba into the air and the animals still
needed to be able to speak and also sing
some of those iconic songs so the
animators would try to reposition the
animals heads when they could so the
audience wouldn't be staring directly
into their mouths and they turned the
characters breathing to their dialogue
and at the same time let the characters
belly muscles and diaphragm tighten so
it would really look like they were
letting out air while talking many CGI
dogs were created for this live-action
remake however the two main stars were
real a mutt named Monty played
while a cocker spaniel named Rose played
lady perhaps nothing was more
challenging than filming the most iconic
scene from the 1955 original when the
two dogs share a plate of spaghetti and
meatballs
this scene took three days to film and
while shooting it the noodles kept
breaking so instead of using actual
noodles they used undyed licorice soaked
in chicken broth this ensured that the
noodle was strong enough for the take
also that the dogs had something quite
tasty to eat the moment where the two
dog snouts touch though that was CGI the
elephants were created with masterful
visual effects work by MPC film however
the actors still needed something on set
to sell the scenes so an actor and a
stunt double in green suits stood in for
baby Dumbo but first they had to learn
to move like a baby elephant which
included walking around on all fours
using these stilts no easy feat on long
shoot days instead of making the genie
character in an entirely CGI creation
Will Smith got to fully embody him and
his dance moves and it was all captured
by a motion capture suit while Aladdin
initially received criticism for how the
genie looked in his blue form the movie
ended up having him in human form
whenever it could and to get a sense of
some of the film's impressive stunts
just look at the one jump ahead sequence
while most movies are shot at 24 frames
per second some parts of this sequence
were shot at a slow-motion 36 frames per
second while others were shot at an
incredibly fast 18 frames per second
according to director Guy Ritchie actor
Meena Masood had to make sure he was
singing completely in sync so at some
parts he had to sing really fast and
other parts really slow
mistress of evil is a sequel to the 2014
retelling of Sleeping Beauty from the
villains perspective this movie had to
make its titular character and many
other characters fly they pulled this
off using two different methods the
first was using wires a more traditional
practical method for lifting up
characters in the air the second way was
lifting actress Angelina Jolie and the
other flying characters up with these
two-pronged Forks the forks are operated
by these extras and blue suits that you
see back here who would later be turned
into CGI backdrops the fork fits onto
both sides of a person's body this
device gives them mobility and allows
them to twist a person around backwards
forwards or side-to-side a 360-degree
movement while the actor is safely
clamped into place meanwhile Maleficent
swings were created with CGI while on
set Jolie wore these on her back which
would later be replaced with wings the
visual effects team was tasked with
making convincing wings and also making
sure those wings moved in sync with the
performers body movements to fully
embody the role of Beast actor Dan
Stevens were a motion capture suit on
stilts the stilts ensured that the actor
was the beasts appropriate height on set
so the actors would be looking at the
right spot however they didn't just have
the character standing in front of green
screens they actually built many of
these sets in England and they are
impressive take the ballroom which was
made with 12,000 square feet of faux
marble and they paid special attention
to the costumes Belle's dress was
decorated with about 2,000 160 Swarovski
crystals and according to actress Emma
Watson the costume designers created it
so it looked like it was floating as
Belle and Beast danced what are some of
your favorite Disney live-action remakes
and which ones are you most looking
forward to let us know in the comments
[Music]