Adam Savage Behind the Scenes of Ghost in the Shell!

Adam Savage visits Weta Workshop to get up close with some of the practical props the effects studio made for the upcoming film Ghost in the Shell. Weta Workshop’s Richard Taylor shows Adam the mechanical geisha masks and animatronic puppets his team created, and how Weta Workshop used new fabrication and design technologies to make these props possible.

Comments (20)

20 thoughts on “Adam Savage Behind the Scenes of Ghost in the Shell!

  1. Oh my god I am so jealous. I would love to have access to
    view some of this stuff up close! This is one of my favorite anime’s and I look
    forward to the new Live Action version.

  2. I can’t for the life of me understand why this movie gets so much hate, even before it is released. Reading the youtube comments (i know) and they are flooded with people saying it is going to suck.

    I hope they manage to make a cult classic in the lines of Blade Runner. At least make it a good action movie, and just let the purists wail on how the wrong people got casts.

  3. Wonderful work they are doing. To answer the hate question there is a lot of people annoyed that they selected Scarlett Johanssen as the Major. Not surprisingly from the Japanese. Frankly I think that that is a mistake as the character requires a certain rare body type and the ability to act as they were totally disconnected in the midst of very hard physical action. There’s also the problem that you need at least some star pull to justify the amount of money this movie will cost.

    A couple things to remember is that the characters as created by Shirow don’t look Japanese, with some exceptions and I’m waiting to see the movie before I cast judgement.

  4. impressive engineering, and much respect to everyone at weta for the quality of their work, but i can’t muster any excitement for the film. i’m already critical of the anime, and i don’t expect snow white and huntsman dude to be able to do it justice. also not much of a fan of scarjo, and doubly so when miscast.

    if this turns out anything other than a formulaic western action film, with bad editing, a lot of action with neither reason nor weight, and a competently polished veneer of set pieces from an old franchise, i’ll be surprised.

  5. This is just beautiful. The amount of detail that the artist and engineers have put into making these Geisha come to life is outstanding. It it does help to see what they look like outside of the movie because now when you watch the actual movie, and even the trailers now, you see all the hard work flow elegantly.

  6. *A

    My god, that animatronic head.

    these are works of fine art, i am completely gob smacked.

    these were in fluorescent shop lights but looked like antique porcelain vases that opens up to a swiss clockwork built in 3 dimensions on curved armatures….. and two experts discussing construction!!!!

  7. in a word: whitewashing. Another potential prominent Asian role is given to a white person because reasons i don’t find too convincing/acceptable. Nothing against ScarJo herself, as she’s a fine actress, but many are reasonably upset that Hollywood, yet again, can’t bring itself to support lead asian actors.

    That being said these are certainly beautiful props and i’m sure the movie will look very nice. Though, also just from the material released about it and the hints of story we’ve gleaned, i’m not holding my breath for anything deeper than your generic action flick.

  8. I hear a lot of people scream this. But it is a western made Hollywood movie, why shouldn’t they pick the actors that will help the movie do good in the general western marked?

    I am a big fan of the GITS series and universe. But a lot of fans are wanting a full Asian cast, talking in Japanese. That for sure wouldn’t bring in the big bucks here in the west. And maybe there is a reason they never made a live action version in Japan before Hollywood picked it up, hard to know for sure.

    One could argue that a middle ground should be found. But we the fans also have to understand that we are not many enough to have Hollywood risk it on just us paying to see the movie.

    All this aside, both Motoko and Batou look very “white” in the anime, along with multiple other characters. I can understand where you are coming from, but don’t think this is the movie people should take this fight over.

  9. “But it is a western made Hollywood movie, why shouldn’t they pick the actors that will help the movie do good in the general western marked?”

    western =/= white. This country is endlessly diverse. there’s no reason not to have accurate casting. the excuse that this should cater to what hollywood feels is the main audience, white people, only further stymies progress. Allowing white washing of films to cater to a white audience only feeds back on itself. A not-the-best example of this sort of thing is when theater used to be primarily, if not exclusively, men. Opting not to cast women in the roles meant for women with the excuse that the audience is primarily male would only serve to continue that trend. Hollywood still has a long way to go when it comes to promoting ethnically diverse roles in films and casting choices like this are at worst racist and at the least cowardly and spineless.

    “All this aside, both Motoko and Batou look very “white” in the anime”

    Batou possibly because of his large build and white hair but Motoko is japanese. Anime, in general, depicts the Japanese. Even though anime is very stylized and includes many anglo-saxon facial features the characters are, by and large, meant to represent Japanese people unless stated otherwise.

    Also the story within the manga and anime itself is tightly tied to japan and the economic and technological boom they experienced in the 60’s. This is the foundation upon which Ghost in the Shell is built so to rip it from that setting and those people does the source material a great disservice.

  10. weird. the comments don’t like me tagging you along with what i wrote. these comment sections are broken as all heck.

  11. I’m hoping that these are already on display during on the weta tour so I can see them this Sunday. I just love the engineering and artistry that goes into this.

  12. Loved the artistry in these pieces, and the craftsmanship that went into the really amazing opening head. But then was kind of let down by the spinning gears. I’m all for exposing the mechanism and can even get behind the fillagreed bone structure. However the intermeshing cogs are just spinning away after it opens, clearly serving no purpose other than to add steampunky detail. I kind of like steampunk, but never when it is adding antiquey mechanisms that do absolutely nothing. It reminds me of cheap battery watches with fake gears added to the face. It frankly is out of place in this movie

  13. People are saying this is going to suck not just because of the whitewashing. This kind of thing has been tried before. Just look at Aeon Flux, The Guyver, Dragonball, Avatar: The Last Airbender, etc…

  14. These Weta/Expanse BTS videos are better than any other such material I’ve ever seen on official DVDs or Bluray. Absolutely fantastic questions, full-length responses and mutual enthusiasm. Bravo guys!

    The only thing that comes close is the Extended Lord of the Rings DVDs, but they lack the dialogue that really make these so enjoyable.

  15. Whitewashing != white cast. There are many other ways a movie can be whitewashed for the western audience. Just think of all the Richard Gere remakes of really interesting Japanese movies. Reduced to a boring, superficial love-story. But in those cases at least there is the original you can watch instead 🙂

    As for Scarlett Johansson: I don’t like her being casted, not primarily since she’s white, but more so since she (in my eyes) just cannot pull off action (or more precise: fighting/hand-to-hand combat) scenes. Just look at her performance as Black Widow… If all we get is a stuntwoman doing stuff (that is cut badly or shaky) and her doing some “cool locking freeze poses” to transition to, then it is not worth her pay.

    Too early to judge what they made of it though. I’m very skeptical, but I’ll give it a try.

  16. These Weta/Expanse BTS videos are better than any other such material I’ve ever seen on official DVDs or Bluray. Absolutely fantastic questions, full-length responses and mutual enthusiasm. Bravo guys!

    The only thing that comes close is the Extended Lord of the Rings DVDs, but they lack the dialogue that really make these so enjoyable.

    no doubt no doubt

    the things that blew me away about star wars when i was a kid were the films, the toys….. and then the behind the scenes stuff. somewhere inside it ‘clicks’ that ‘someone did this… i can do stuff too’. its magic, like a meme that has some social uplifting value. what i love most about this site

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