With Jurassic Park, the animators over at Industrial Light and Magic had achieved what could have been considered to be the peak of computer technology: using their imaginations and a little bit of high-tech stuff, they'd managed to recreate beings whose kind had not walked the earth in 60 million years. However, it was quickly obvious that a follow-up was required, and Jumanji provided ILM with a new challenge.

One of the aspects which helped Jurassic Park pull off it's illusion was the humans perception of the dinosaurs. Nobody had ever seen a tyrannosaur walk across a road, so therefore the animators were safe in creating the animal however they wanted. Jumanji presented a much different problem. Everyone has seen an elephant lumber along, or watched a monkey run through some hilarious antics. So it was going to be much more detailed work to create a rhinocerous than a triceratops.

[Image courtesy of the VFXHQ]

Another problem presented to the ILM team was the nature of these new animals. Unlike the lizard-like scales of a dinosaur, the new creatures they were working with were mammals, and that meant hair. And hair meant a problem. Realistic hair is very difficult to create, and the ILM people spent the better part of a year trying to get the hair for the lion's mane just right. This involved isolating each individual hair, figuring out the translucency, lighting, shadow, movement, and interaction with each other hair, calculating the group effect, and then rendering the entire thing. This is a tedious process to say the least.

Jumanji represented a first in computer animation: an attempt to fool people with animations of creatures that already exist. It was a valiant effort, but ultimately it needed more touch-up work to be as believeable as such movies as Jurassic Park or Twister. After all, realistic hair takes a lot of time; something they didn't have while making the movie.

Jumanji
Visual Effects HQ: Jumanji
Jumanji Media Page
Computer Effects: Creatures, Jurassic Park
Visual Effects HQ: ILM
Computer Effects: Creatures, Twister

Last Updated August 22, 1996