The Conjuring 2

I watched a behind the scenes video on The Conjuring 2 for my behind the scenes project. It’s a movie I’ve watched before and I remembered it having some very interesting camera movements and scenes. One of the things I liked a lot about how they filmed was all the practical effects. They usd a really low amount of CGI for their scare tactics, which made the movie feel scarier and more authentic. They used camera lighting and movement to make a lot of the scares happen that they could have just used CGI for, but they didn’t and it worked really well.

The way they did the camerawork also was really cool to me. In the movie there is a lot of long take and moving shots. In the behind the scenes I got to see the way that they made these shots. They had a lot of gyroscopic camera stabilizers and little tramcar things that they would sit on, moving the camera while someone else moved the cart.

The director was also very active in the shoot. Instead of just telling people what he wanted them to do, he would show them what he wanted, talk to them and listen to their ideas. There was a scene at the end where they needed rain for the shot, so they set up an entire rain system out of sprinklers and made a makeshift rainstorm for just that short. The way the movie was filmed, the main actors spent most of the film in isolation or with only a few other people. This helped the producers almost completely eliminate the need for extras. The only scenes that had extras could have been removed from the movie and you’d never notice. I like this because the more 1 on 1 time with the actors helps the viewers create a stronger bond with them. It’s very smart especially in a horror film because you’ll actually worry for them if they are in danger. I was also pretty amazed with the actors. They were able to just throw themselves into their roles, even with all the people in the production team watching them. Even the child actors were very good at it. I think when you’re in environment where everyone is working on, invested and care about the same thing, people are more comfortable with their work and can really get into it. The actors all also seemed to be good friends with each other which must have also helped.

Again with the lack of CGI I was very impressed. The only green screen they really had was on the ceilings to hide that it was a set. The practical effects in this movie were just really good.