The History of Matte Painting

Hi folks, here's a little presentation i did for school. It's a video clip showing several scenes from famous movies which include - in my opinion - some of the most stunning matte paintings in film history. And i think it's just interesting to see how this great visual effect developed in the last 60 years.

You can also visit my personal matte painting homepage with some mps i did myself here:
http://tlulrich.home.solnet.ch/digitalart.html

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• matte
• painting
• film
• history
• visual
• effect
• ben
• hur
• blade
• runner

[leonardoye]

this was really matte painting for all the movies? are u sure even in star treck?

[jonasulrich]

yeah, i'm pretty sure that in all those clips were matte paintings at least partly involved. Same goes for "Star Trek" - off course it's not a 2D glass paint like you see in "Ben Hur", but it's exactly what you call a matte painting today: a digital collage, combined with 2.5-D layering... and off course a lot of little 3D stuff (like the smoke parts or the little elevator).

And even if the ship was completly a 3D model... the sky in the background just has to be a matte painting. ;)

[holonat]

@leonardoye Yep, during the first Star Trek movie, a lot of the scenes of V'Ger was matte paintings as well :)

[taistelutomaatti]

The Blade Runner scene where the spinner flies across the city view was made with miniatures. There were hell of a lot huge scenes with matte paintings in Blade Runner you could have used instead, for example the scene in Tyrell corporation where the shutters close on the window.

[darthstarkiller1912]

Don't be offended, but you forgot "The Wizard of Oz".

[kuikai100]

a+++++++++++++

[lukassstyyy]

Very good. I will have this video as inspiration. Love the matte painting. Thanks.

[mordecaidesign]

@jonasulrich This is a great little collection of some great matte work. I see some Whitlock shots in there and a great Pangrazio shot as well.

@justinb1969 is right about the 2 Blade Runner shots, but Matthew Yulricich provided about 20 matte paintings for the film. The most famous shots are of Harrison Ford hanging by one hand near the end of the film and a shot inside Tyrell's office where Rachel is walking towards Deckard before he gives her the empathy test.

[SSegal]

Nice presentation, good choice of music. But you left out the first 50 years. Blade Runner is models mixed with matte paintings.

[wmcoughlan]

If you want to see some amazing modern matte design check out "Nuit Blanche", a film by Arev Manoukian. It's on my page.

[justinb1969]

The BladeRunner stuff is all minature photography. No matte paintings at all.