Now more than ever it has become much easier to watch movies at will. Thanks to streaming platforms like Amazon Prime Video and Netflix we have not only seen a lot of older movies find their way to these platforms but also these platforms have put in the money to create new franchises and new movies. This was of course the delight of many people but there has been a lot of discourse online about the use of special effects and the lack of practical effects. When discussing practical effects many people talk about blood squibs for example. Still, one of the bigger parts of special effects that have changed a lot over the past decade is the amount of green cream used instead of filming on location or creating sets. While many people say that creating sets is too much trouble or too expensive many of them aren’t aware of what goes into building those sets. So, let’s take a deeper look at what goes into the business of building film sets and creating the movie magic that often goes unseen behind the scenes.
For many people, it might seem silly to have to build a set to film inside of a house or inside of an apartment. The reality though is that while it may be adequate for smaller-budget films to film inside buildings often, it is easier for bigger-budget films to create an old apartment set from scratch since it allows you to light and film from every angle you wish. This is why often you might not even realize that your favorite show or your favorite movie is not filmed on location. This is why when they create sets, they often will deal with architects as well as set designers to be able to fully recreate to scale the interior of a building they’ve chosen to be the physical representation of the location they will be in. This is often done so that you can have the ideal space without having to displace the people who are living or working there. If you ever need to film outside the building, you can simply put some slight window dressing on the building itself to make it appear as it should for the show or movie and have your location.
When we talk about said building itself It’s important to understand from this that we are talking about actual construction. There is a lot of work from specialists like carpenters who are involved in the actual physical building of these sets. While most sets are built on studio lots and inside Many set pieces become part of on-location filming. This is why sometimes you will see streets being closed or buildings being used for filming have things built around them as additional set dressing. Adding to this you might even see a partial green screen added especially for period movies where studios have to account for the skyline and backdrops. This mix of set building and green screen has become pretty common both on location and in the studio for most films going from Avengers to The Irishman.
One of the main reasons why studios have moved away from doing fully practical sets is not only because of the amount of money costs to hire all these specialized workers to build those. There is also the reality that many production companies simply don’t want to put the money into sets that they will either have to store or destroy after the filming is over. It is not only a question of set building costs but also of self storage building costs to be able to house all the props and the set pieces they might want to keep. This is an issue not only because of cost but also because of land since many of the big studios find themselves in major cities where it is extremely difficult to find new viable land to build studio lots on. If you take this into account, it might become a lot easier to understand the popularity of things like Disney’s volume projected set and the general use of VFX to be able to save some of the costs that could go into building physical sets.
