Eight things you didn’t know about ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’

As a tech geek and movie fanatic, I jumped at the opportunity to visit Weta Digital in New Zealand, the renowned special effects studio responsible for the groundbreaking visuals in movies like Avatar, Lord of the Rings, Tin Tin, King Kong and Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

Out this week on DVD and Blu-ray, Twentieth Century Fox's Rise of the Planet of the Apes tells of a scientist (played by James Franco) who, while attempting to find a cure for Alzheimer's disease, accidentally gives his beloved chimpanzee, Caesar, much greater intelligence.

This sci-fi flick -- which serves as a prequel, of sorts, to the original 1968 Planet of the Apes -- was one of my favourite movies of 2011, and seeing how Weta Digital created the visual effects was a huge treat, to say the least.

If you don't mind the odd spoiler (you might want to watch the movie before continuing), read on for eight things you might not know about Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Weta Digital (co-founded by Academy Award-winning director Peter Jackson) and the magic behind the creation of Caesar.

1. No monkeys were hurt in the making of this film

The first thing I learned while sitting in the huge theatre at Weta Digital was the fact there were no real monkeys used in the making of this movie. None. This blew me away. This is especially surprising if you recall the opening scene, where chimps are in the wild and captured by hunters. But all of the monkeys were digitally created.

2. First time for everything

Thanks to technology, Rise of the Planet of the Apes is the first live-action film to star — and be told from the point of view of — an ape. Caesar is a sentient animal, with human-like characteristics, actions and motivations, and not only was he the focus of this epic story, but his convincing performance evoked emotion out of the viewer.

3. No 'Serkis' freak

While Caesar is digitally created as a CGI character, his motions and facial expressions were that of Andy Serkis, the award-winning English actor best known for his outstanding performance as Gollum in The Lord of the Rings. For the motion-capture (see below), Serkis was outfitted with a special body suit and head-mounted camera pointing to his face to capture his performance. Andy even wore monkey-like teeth to help get into character.

4. Research rules

The folks at Weta said they got plenty of reference material by visiting the Auckland zoo, photographing a primate sanctuary in Wellington (the capital of New Zealand, where Weta is based) and even by watching YouTube videos of chimps, gorillas and orangutan (though there wasn't much on orangutans, they said). Andy Serkis also took off to Africa to study primate behaviour before the making of the film.

5. Suits me

On the motion-capture ("mo-cap") set at Weta in New Zealand, actors performed various scenes as primates, all of whom wore special suits with dozens of small sensors on them. Special cameras then capture the sequences, in real time, and then imports them into a computer to animate the digital apes. While at Weta, I had a chance to act out a few scenes myself (check out the January "Gear Guide" video segment at Cineplex movie theatres and its sister chains).

6. A bridge too far

If you've seen the film — or even the trailers for it — you're well aware of a climactic scene on the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco. Believe it or not, the real bridge wasn't used at all. Instead, Weta created the biggest 3D model it has ever made. The bridge is comprised of about 3.5 million objects (totalling 70,000,000 polygons) and was used for some fancy "camera" work that swooped down under the bridge and above it, between the girders and cables, in one seamless shot. The ambitious bridge scene had 250 shots in 11 minutes, and mostly visual effects.

7. Canadian connection

Did you know part of this flick was shot in Canada? Filming began in Vancouver, British Columbia, in July 2010, including many of the action-oriented bridge sequences. For those in the area, massive green screens were erected on an enormous gravel field at Kent and Boundary (near the Fraser River path). An areial scene, helicopter crash, bus turnover and horse riders were also shot here in "Hollywood North."

8. Ready for your close-up

Some of the more informative sessions at the Weta trip involved texturing and how they created such lifelike creatures and objects in the movie. The close-up shots of the apes were especially impressive, many of which were created using molds of skin, then adding wrinkles, fur, hair, colour, blemishes, lighting and other features. Baby oil-based latex skin molds were put through a powerful scanner, digitized, then manipulated though PhotoShop and other paint programs (including proprietary ones made by Weta).