Description
Book SynopsisHow one company created the dominant aesthetic of digital realism.
Trade ReviewTurnock finds new ground to cover in
The Empire of Effects...a captivating look at digital realism and the success of ILM. * The Film Stage *
Turnock’s expansive study of Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) and by turns of the wider special effects industry provides insight, nuance, and practical reactions to an industry that often dominates the filmmaking process and erodes the elements of story, direction, or performance...Highly recommended. * CHOICE *
As a close study of [Industrial Light & Magic], the book is enlightening. But it’s also about far more: Turnock chronicles the rise of the contemporary effects industry in the 1970s and ’80s, the emergence of an oligopoly of studios based in California, and the way that mega-budget franchises like
The Lord of the Rings and
Harry Potter came to shape the effects industry of today...By tracing the history of special effects since the 1970s, Turnock shows readers how the tools that shaped the counterculture’s alternative visions lent themselves to a new set of labor relations in which a stronger, more concentrated corporate bloc took more and allowed less. * The Nation *
Any historian of merit would commend and envy her usage of these primary source materials. * The Journal of American Culture *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction: The ILM Version
1. ILM Versus Everybody Else: Effects Houses in the Digital Age
2. Perfect Imperfection: ILM’s Effects Aesthetics
3. Retconning CGI Innovation: ILM’s Rhetorical Dominance of Effects History
4. Monsters are Real: ILM’s International Standard of Effects Realism in the Global Marketplace
5. That Analog Feeling: Disney, Marvel Studios, and the ILM Aesthetic
Conclusion: Unreal Engine: ILM in a Disney World
Appendix: List of Films Mentioned in the Text
Notes
Bibliography
Index
