The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies Gets Sound Editing Oscar Nom

The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies only received a single Oscar nomination this year in the category of Sound Editing. Personally I think it also deserved a nod in the Visual Effects category. Sadly it is unlikely to win as the technical categories (VFX, Sound, etc) get voted on by the entire Academy which is mostly comprised of 60+ old white men actors and as a result they tend to just vote according to what their favorite film is that had nothing to do with the category itself. As a result its really between American Sniper and Birdman. The full list of Oscar nominations can be found here.

Sound Editing
American Sniper – Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – Martin Hernández and Aaron Glascock
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies – Brent Burge and Jason Canovas
Interstellar – Richard King
Unbroken – Becky Sullivan and Andrew DeCristofaro

Peter Jackson Gets Star on Hollywood Walk of Fame

As for of the release for the final Middle-Earth film, Peter Jackson received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on December 8th. Around a 1000 fans showed up for the ceremony that was attended by Jackson, his family and actors Orlando Bloom, Richard Armitage, Evangeline Lilly, Andy Serkis and Elijah Wood.

Peter Jackson Getting Star on Walk of Fame

The Walk of Fame Selection Committee announced Thursday that Sir Peter Jackson is one of several that will get a star on the Hollywood attraction in 2015. Apparently Jackson said he was "chuffed" by the news. Below is the full list of honoree's for 2015.

Motion pictures – Raymond Chandler (posthumous), Eugenio Derbez, Will Ferrell, Jennifer Garner, Peter Jackson, Bob Kane (posthumous), Daniel Radcliffe, Paul Rudd, Snoopy, Melissa McCarthy and Christoph Waltz

Television – James L Brooks, Ken Ehrlich, Bobby Flay, Seth MacFarlane, Julianna Margulies, Chris O’Donnell, Jim Parsons, Amy Poehler, Kelly Ripa and Sofia Vergara

Recording – Lukasz ‘Dr Luke’ Gottwald, Kool & The Gang, Pitbull, Al Schmitt and Pharrell Williams

Radio – Larry Elder

Live Theater/Live Performance – Kristin Chenoweth, Dick Gregory and Ennio Morricone

The Desolation of Smaug Receives Three Oscar Nominations

Today the Academy of Motion Pictures of Arts and Sciences officially announced the nominations for the the 86th Annual Academy Awards. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug received three nominations in the Visual Effects, Sound Editing and Sound Mixing categories. Congrats to the crew on the recognition of their fantastic work. Sadly odds are very long with them winning as suspect a Gravity sweep. The winners will be announced during the Oscar telecast on March 2nd. The full list of nominations is here.

Visual Effects
Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Iron Man 3
The Lone Ranger
Star Trek Into Darkness

Sound Editing
All is Lost
Captain Phillips
Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Lone Survivor

Sound Mixing
Captain Phillips
Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Inside Llewyn Davis
Lone Survivor

The Hobbit Nominated for 9 Saturn Awards

Today the nominations for the 38th Annual Saturn Awards given out by The Academy of Science Fiction Fantasy and Horror Films were announced with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey leading the pack with nine nominations. The Saturn Awards are designed to recognize the genre" movies of science fiction, fantasy, horror and comic book adaptations that will never be recognized by the mainstream awards that Hollywood gives out to itself every year. The awards are given out in 20 movie categories, 9 TV categories and 4 home entertainment categories. While the nominees were announced for some inexplicable reason the award ceremony date and location was not (but then its not really star studded nor televised event) as more symbolic then anything. Any case the categories The Hobbit are in is below, the full list of nominations are here.

The Hobbit Wins Science Oscar Awards

On Sunday The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey received its first Oscar awards via The Academy's Scientific and Technical Awards hosted by Star Trek's Chris Pine and Zoe Saldana. While it does't get much attention, it is recognized that often film requires advancements in science to achieve greatness in some of the flashier categories like outstanding visual effects. In this case Simon Clutterbuck, Richard Dorling, and James Jacobs were recognized for creating "Tissue: A Physically-Based Character Simulation Framework." As Jacobs put it, "The framework is used to construct and simulate the anatomical components of our digital creatures and characters" such as Gollum. Since science doesn't always fall into neat categories, the science awards are recognition of innovation that advances the film industry. Other winners include Richard Mall for his Matthews Max Menace Arm for making it easier to light sets in often difficult conditions and locations and team behind the Light system that combined light, color and rendering into one (which used to require separate passes for each). More details can be found here and here. Congrats to the team and good luck on getting more on February 24th. (via TORn)

The Hobbit Wins VES Award

Last night The 11th Annual VES Awards were held by the Visual Effects Society that honors various categories of visual effects in commercials, TV, video games and movies. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey won the "Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture" category but lost in the five other categories it was nominated in. While VES doesn't really inform on who will win the Oscars, the near sweep of Life of Pi probably didn't hurt that movies chances either. Below in black is who won in each The Hobbit nominated categories with the full list of winners here. Congrats the VFX crew of The Hobbit.

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

The Hobbit Almost Missed Oscar Nomination

In mid January The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey was nominated in the Best Visual Effects category for the Academy Awards (Oscar). According to Variety, it almost missed the chance back on November 2012 when the 40-member visual effects branch committee was putting together its "long list" of 20 possible films to submit that would eventually get cut down to the "bake-off" of 10 films that would then be cut to the final five.

Thanks to a change in scheduling, the bake-off would be held on January 3rd resulting in a need to make a decision on November 28 for who would be on the long list. The problem is many of the probable contenders would not even get their release until mid-December or later, like The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The result is members had to basically decide if the movie would be included based only on the visual effects in the trailers.

Basically the film received its initial slot not on its merits but by the shear reputation of Weta Digital and Peter Jackson. That decision eventually led to the film earning its slot as a major contender for the Best Visual Effects Oscar with the winner being announced on February 24th. The plan is to re-evaluate the process to avoid a repeat situation, especially since The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug is likely to create a repeat situation unless it is addressed. (via TORn)

The Hobbit: AUJ Recieves Three Oscar Nominations

This morning the nominations for the 85th Annual Academy Awards were announced. While many film awards will be handed out over the next month, this is the primary prize. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey received three in the categories of Best Production Design, Best Visual Effects and Best Makeup & Styling. Lincoln received the most with 12 nominations followed by Life of Pi's eleven. Over the next month the members of the Academy of Arts and Sciences will vote on the movies with the winners revealed on February 24th. The host will be Family Guy, American Dad, and Ted creator Seth McFarlane. The full list of nominees can be found here.

Makeup
Hitchcock
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Les Miserables

Production Design
Anna Karenina
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Les Miserables
Life of Pi
Lincoln

Visual Effects
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Life of Pi
Marvel’s The Avengers
Prometheus
Snow White and the Huntsman

The Hobbit: AUJ Receives Three BAFTA Nominations

Today the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) announced its nominees for the best in film for 2013. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey received three nominations in the categories of Make Up & Hair, Sound, and Special Visual Effects. The award is sort of the United Kingdom equivalent of the Oscar so a prestigious honor but not quite at the same level as an Academy Award nomination. The award ceremony will take place on February 10th at London's Royal Opera House. I believe they are televised in the UK but not elsewhere. The full list of nominations in 24 categories can be found here.

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

The Hobbit: UEJ on Oscar VFX Short List

Thursday The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey was announced as 1 of 10 films that is on the shortlist of 10 films to potentially compete for the Best Visual Effects Oscar. The Oscar is the highest film award in Hollywood and considered a huge achievement to even be nominated.

The 10 films: The Amazing Spider-Man, Cloud Atlas, The Dark Knight Rises, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, John Carter, Life of Pi, The Avengers, Prometheus, Skyfall and Snow White & the Huntsman

The visual effects branch of the Academy will have a "bake-off" on January 3rd where they can view a 10 minute reel for each film that highlights the movies visual effects. From that, the branch will vote on who the five finalists are which will be announced on January 10, 2013. At that point the entire Academy will be able to vote on who will win the Best Visual Effects Oscar which will be announced during the 85th ACademy Awards presentation on February 24, 2013.