For as advanced and as lifelike as CGI effects have become over the last decade, physical props are still the bedrock of modern special effects—especially in movies about a guy in a robotic suit. Gizmodo recently sat down with two of Iron Man 3's effects masters, Shane Patrick Mahan and Lindsay MacGowan of Legacy Effects, who have worked on the groundbreaking effects of classic films like Terminator 2, Avatar, and Monster Squad, as well as Chris Townsend, the film's Visual Effects Supervisor, to find out how much of Iron Man is really real. Read More >>

It's one thing to make a giant, robotic Tyrannosaurus Rex. It's another thing entirely to make it look remotely real. Granted, a robo-rex is awesome in its own right, but it's just not quite the flavour of monster fit for a film like Jurassic Park. And so. it was practical effects to the rescue yet again with a carefully applied dino-skin. Read More >>

As a young pup watching Jurassic Park, I was in terrified of the T-Rex, fearful of the Raptors, in awe of the Brachiosaurus and annoyed of that little spraying dinosaur. But probably above all, I felt for the Triceratops. It was hurt! It was dying! It was so incredibly detailed. Stan Winston School revealed how they built the Triceratops, how they painted it, how they shipped it and how the puppeteers controlled it in this video. Part two of the Triceratops video can be found here. [Stan Winston School] Read More >>

Unlike other shows who sneakily add special effects without you realising, The Walking Dead is so overtly gruesome and bloody and gore-y that we're completely aware that what we see is being spiced up with visual effects. Still, it's awesome to see how the effects are added. Stargate Studios shows off the reel of effects it worked on for this past season 3 of The Walking Dead. Spoiler alerts, obviously. Read More >>

Jurassic Park was awesome. Jurassic Park in 3D is awesome layered on awesome. And the tech behind the scenes? You can probably see where this is going. Read More >>

In shots where they were seen walking, Jurassic Park's resident brachiosaurs were realised with ground-breaking computer animation. But for shots when the film's human characters interacted with them high in the trees, the brachiosaurs were brought to life with complicated animatronics created by Stan Winston Studios. Read More >>

The original Jurassic Park came out 20 years ago, and while the FX industry has shifted more towards computer-generated effects since its release, it's still awesome to see how some of the film's practical effects were realised. Read More >>

New tumblr alert: Before VFX. It's a revealing collection of pictures that show what movies look like before any sort of visual effects are added. Which basically means it makes every movie, even Oscar-worthy movies, look completely ridiculous. The magic of the movies! Read More >>

Yesterday we saw how ILM created a whole load of kick-ass CGI scenes from The Avengers. Now feast your eyes on just how they created the immense beast that is the Hulk, in The Avengers. Read More >>

Before special effect artists can bring a creation like a T-Rex to life with robotics and animatronics, they first have to build and sculpt a life-size detailed mockup of the creature out of clay. And while it's probably one of the best jobs on earth, seeing the artists at Stan Winston Studios having to hand-carve every single scale on the Jurassic Park T-Rex somehow makes your own to-do list seem a little less daunting. Read More >>

48 FPS or otherwise, The Hobbit features a wealth of stunning, unreal creatures like any good fantasy movie should. The magic behind it all—of course—is CGI, but motion capture and a variety of augmented reality shooting techniques makes the work behind the scenes almost as cool as the finished product. It's second only to actually rounding up some real-life trolls and goblins. [The Daily] Read More >>

You've never seen a skateboarding video with angles like this. As skateboarder Danny Brady goes in for his trick, you'll see a slow motion, almost bullet-timed view of him. But. It's not real. As incredibly detailed as it is, it's all fake. You won't believe it. Read More >>

Sometimes things on TV can look so real that we think it's happening in real life. That's the magic of the moving pictures! Like this fake plane crash for the TV show Chicago Fire, it fooled the news broadcast WGN-TV and tricked real people on the ground too. Read More >>

The Dark Knight Rises was pretty incredible for many reasons, truly living up to the hype. But one of the most jaw-dropping bits was when Bane blew-up an American football stadium right at the start of a game. Here's how they actually did it. Read More >>

From evil cars with minds of their own to chainsaws used to torture and taunt -- many of our favourite horror movies would be nothing without a little technology. Here's how it played a role in some of the spookiest stories on film. (Warning: GIFs) Read More >>