The Amazing Visual Effects of "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them"

First trip to America?

Yes.

[suitcase lock unclicks]

[owl hoots]

Must get that fixed.

[Uniformed Man] Anything edible in there?

[suitcase lock squeaks]

No.

[majestic music]

[loud rush of air]

[hurtling of car through the air]

[dramatic music]

Hi, I'm Mike Seymour from fxguide.com for Wired,

and welcome to our guide to erumpent mating dances.

Newt, the British Magizoologist,

arrives in New York,

after being expelled from Hogwarts,

in JK Rowling's new world of

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

Yes, where is this man?

[knuckles rap on suitcase]

[suitcase lid creaks open]

So, you're the guy with the case full of monsters, huh?

News travels fast.

[majestic music]

[coins clinking]

Put this on.

Why would I have to wear something like this?

Because your skull is susceptible to breakage

under immense force.

[Mike] One of the many creatures that Newt must deal with

is kind of a magical horny rhino beast on heat,

known as a erumpent.

[majestic music]

Seen here in a shot that was actually added

quite late in production,

with our heroes trying to capture the creature on ice.

[majestic music]

One of the highlights of the film came actually from just

five words in JK's original script,

which eloquently just stated Newt does a mating dance.

The path from this to the screen involved

18 foot fiberglass puppets, choreographers,

animators and the lead star Eddie Redmayne

actually acting out complex video selfies

and then sending them to director David Yates.

The actual effects work fell to Tim Burke and Christian Manz

and the team at Framestore.

Now while many companies contributed from MPC, Method,

D Neg, Cinesite and others,

it was Framestore and the brilliant legacy

from creating Dobby in the original Harry Potter films

that led to this outstanding character work in this

particular film.

Eddie was completely committed to working with the

character team as early as possible,

actually filmed himself with some help

from his choregrapher from The Danish Girl,

for his side of the mating ritual,

and then sent that to director, David Yates.

The erumpents animation approach was actually typical of a

different way they worked with characters in this film.

Framestore's animation supervisor, Pablo Grillo,

was given quite a lot of time before principal photography,

not just to have the team look at designs,

but actually,

animation studies of all the creatures in the film.

Pablo and the team therefore managed to

work out the erumpents mating ritual

well before the actual filming started.

This allowed the team behind the War Horse

stage production puppet to build a 18 foot high,

20 foot long, four man erumpent rig out of fiberglass

and learn all of Pablo's sexy moves.

Eddie would then rehearse with

this giant puppet and in fact,

worked out with it on set.

Once the framing and timing was right,

the team was then able to remove that

and of course film a clean plate with just Eddie

and then add in the character in post production,

with just this, superb interaction with Newt.

This approach of using puppeteers was actually used on

all of the cast of creatures in the film,

from the bowtruckle to the young marmite.

Now we often,

and I guess quite rightly,

focus on the creative skills of the animators,

but increasingly it's these puppeteers on set,

led in this case by Robin Guiver,

who are producing this terrific interaction for the actors,

that allows such believable performances to be captured.

[Newt] Nothing to worry about.

That is a murtlap.

Well don't forget,

subscribe for more behind the scenes action.

I'm Mike Seymour, for Wired.

[dramatic music]

Was that everything that came out of the case?

[soaring music]

[Threatening Voice] Time's running out, Mr squid.

[dramatic music]

[regal music]