In its latest contribution to the prodigious ‘The Lord of the Rings’ franchise, Prime Video’s expansive series now nominated for 6 Emmy’s including Outstanding Special Visual Effects, pioneering visual effects company Wētā FX, led by VFX Supervisor Ken McGaugh, makes subterranean kingdoms pulse with life and creatures like Balrogs, Snow Trolls, and Wargs be the nastiest they can be.
They were there at the beginning, way back in 2001, when The Fellowship of the Ring, the first of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films, hit the big screen. And now, more than 20 years later, New Zealand-based visual effects studio Wētā FX continues to bring its special brand of optical magic to the latest iteration of J.R.R. Tolkien’s mythical world, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.
Developed by J. D. Payne and Patrick McKay for Prime Video, The Rings of Power is based on both Tolkien’s beloved novel and its appendices. The series, set thousands of years before the events of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, takes viewers back to the fabled Second Age of Middle-earth's history, an era in which great powers were forged, kingdoms rose and fell, unlikely heroes were tested, and heinous villains threatened to cover the world in darkness. Ranging from the darkest depths of the Misty Mountains, to the majestic forests of the elf-capital of Lindon, to the breathtaking island kingdom of Númenor, the epic drama, like so many of Wētā’s projects, offered many opportunities for the fabled studio to prove its mettle.
“Wētā’s involvement in the project was two-fold,” says VFX Supervisor Ken McGaugh. “Firstly, we provided most of the on-set support, and collaborated closely with the clients to build a pipeline for managing the massive amounts of data acquired across the entire shoot. Then, for post-production, Wētā was tasked with some key environments, including the ancient subterranean kingdom Khazad-dûm, [the watchtower] Ostirith, the prologue battlefields, and [the far northern region of Middle-earth] Forodwaith.”
The work on Forodwaith included both an icy waterfall and Durnost, the abandoned fortress of the evil lord Sauron. Wētā was also responsible for some of the CG creatures and scenes they appear in, including the snow troll and the wolf-like warg. “As a special treat,” McGaugh adds, “we also had the pleasure of bringing some of the creatures from the original films back to life, including the balrog, fell beast, and the battle eagle.”
Asked what he and his crew found most challenging in the wide diversity of tasks for which they were responsible, McGaugh says that each sequence had its own unique set of complications.
“The prologue battle shots were challenging due to the sheer number of elf and orc soldiers, as well as the fell beasts and battle eagles in the air,” he recounts. “The ice wall and kilometer-tall waterfall at the beginning of Episode 1 were difficult to light and render due to the translucent ice everywhere. And both the snow troll and warg fights were tricky to animate and integrate since they involved interaction with the actors.”
However, McGaugh says, from a creative perspective, he found Khazad-dûm both the most challenging and the most rewarding.
“We were given the challenge to not only make this underground city look expansive, but also make it feel alive with gardens, waterfalls, and greenery,” he explains. “This was quite different from all the previous underground dwarf cities we’ve built, and there wasn’t much real-world reference we could rely upon.”
While he’s been associated as a VFX supervisor with many high-profile features of the last decade – including Godzilla, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Thor: Love and Thunder, and Avatar: The Way of Water – The Rings of Power was McGaugh’s first experience working on an episodic project. He found it both the same and different.
“The expectations on this were just as high as those on feature films,” he shares, “but with the increased 4K resolution. A major challenge we faced from it being episodic was the overlap between the shoot schedule and post schedule. Fortunately, we were able to bring on Stephen Unterfranz as a co-supervisor. We divided the work in a way that prevented us from being stretched too thin between being on set and supervising the shot work.”
As for the technology used on the show, McGaugh says that because the project went on a long time – production extended from February 2020 to August 2021 – the team was able to take advantage of continual updates and improvements to both the commercial software packages they use, as well as their internal apps and tools. And, of course, like every other feature or series produced during that singular period in human history, there was a pandemic to contend with.
“COVID hit us mid-project,” McGaugh recalls, “so like everybody else in the world we had to very quickly update our communication and review tools to allow us to work from home.”
