When Amblin Entertainment brought Batteries Not Included to Industrial Light & Magic, visual effects supervisor Bruce Nicholson found the prospect of creating a family of pint-size anthropomorphic flying saucers both intriguing and challenging. Principal among the challenges was the need to create ships that could be photographed in real time on live-action sets and also in bluescreen environments under motion control. Most importantly, the imagery produced through employment of these two techniques had to be stylistically indistinguishable even when cut together end to end. Developed to support the effort was a sophisticated new wire rig and a winning array of flying machines brought to life via overhead wires, motion control, rod puppetry, stop-motion animation and go-motion.
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