The Hobbit: AUJ Up for Visual Effect Society Awards

Today the Visual Effects Society (VES) announced their nominees for the 11th Annual VES Awards " which recognize outstanding visual effects artistry in 24 categories of film, animation, television, commercials and video games." The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey received 7 nominations in 6 categories. The award ceremony will be held on Tuesday, February 5th, 2013 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in California. The show isn't televised and to my knowledge doesn't really inform on who will win Academy Awards but if part of the The Hobbit visual effects team, they probably love the recognition as it is coming from their peers and not some outsider who doesn't really understand just how hard it is to pull off what they do. Below are The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey nominated categories with the full list of VES nominations here.

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Visual Effects-Driven Feature Motion Picture
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Joe Letteri, Eileen Moran, Eric Saindon, Kevin L. Sherwood
Prometheus - Paul Butterworth, Charley Henley, Allen Maris, Richard Stammers
Life of Pi - Thomas Fisher, Susan Macleod, Guillaume Rocheron, Bill Westenhofer
The Avengers - Susan Pickett, Janek Sirrs, Jeff White, Guy Williams
Battleship - Grady Cofer, Pablo Helman, Jeanie King, Glen Mcintosh

Outstanding Animated Character in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture
The Hobbit: Goblin King - Jung Min Chan, James Jacobs, David Clayton, Guillaume Francois
The Hobbit: Gollum - Gino Acevedo, Alessandro Bonora, Jeff Capogreco, Kevin Estey
The Avengers: The Hulk - Marc Chu, John Doublestein, Cyrus Jam, Jason Smith
Life of Pi: Richard Parker - Erik De Boer, Sean Comer, Betsy Asher Hall, Kai-Hua Lan

Outstanding Created Environment in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture
The Hobbit: Goblin Caverns - Ryan Arcus, Simon Jung, Alastair Maher, Anthony M. Patti
Prometheus: LV-233 - Julien Bolbach, Marco Genovesi, Martin Riedel, Marco Rolandi
The Avengers: Midtown Manhattan - Richard Bluff, Giles Hancock, David Meny, Andy Proctor
Life of Pi: Open Ocean - Jason Bayever, Sho Hasegawa, Jimmy Jewell, Walt Jones

Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Matt Aitken, Victor Huang, Christian Rivers, R. Christopher White
The Avengers: Downtown Manhattan - Colin Benoit, Jeremy Goldman, Tory Mercer, Anthony Rispoli
Total Recall: Hover Car Chase - Daniel Baldwin, Mattias Forsstrom, Sam Schwier, Joshua Wassung
The Amazing Spider-Man - Rob Engle, David Schaub, Cosku Turhan, Max Tyrie

Outstanding FX and Simulation Animation in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Areito Echevarria, Chet Leavai, Garry Runke, Francois Sugny
Life of Pi: Storm of God - Harry Mukhopadhyay, David Stopford, Mark Williams, Derek Wolfe
Battleship - Florent Andorra, Willi Geiger, Rick Hankins, Florian Witzel
Life of Pi: Ocean - Jason Bayever, David Horsley, Scott Townsend, Miles Vignol

Outstanding Compositing in a Feature Motion Picture
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Jean-Luc Azzis, Steven Mcgillen, Christoph Salzmann, Charles Tait
Life of Pi: Storm of God - Ryan Clarke, Jose Fernandez, Sean Oharas, Hamish Schumacher
The Avengers: Hulk Punch - Chris Balog, Peter Demarest, Nelson Sepulveda, Alan Travis
Prometheus: Engineers & the Orrery - Xavier Bourque, Sam Cole, Simone Riginelli, Denis Scolan