Tiny hands and toppling heads show off 'SNL' visual effects
This fun video-effects compilation features heads and limbs flying, a creepy girl crawling out of a TV set, and yes, the president gets a hand.
- Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year" award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
Confession time: Sometimes I think I like these "Saturday Night Live" behind-the-scenes videos better than I like the show itself. My favorite is still the one where the crew tears down the set in two minutes, but a new video posted Wednesday showcases the work of the visual-effects crew.
"SNL creates a new show from scratch in under a week," the video text notes. "By the time footage gets to the visual-effects team, they have less than 12 hours."
These are the unsung heroes who use computer graphics and techniques combined with green screens to make it appear that the cast members are flying through the air, growing alien tongues, smashing the windows out of cars, crawling out of TVs a la "The Ring," or, for some reason, losing limbs, A lot of limbs. And also heads. Who knew "SNL" had this much dismemberment? It's all "Game of Thrones" and Ramsay Bolton up there in Studio 8H, apparently.
But one of the best moments (one minute in) shows how the visual-effects team shrinks a pair of hands (presumably actor Alec Baldwin's) to poke fun at President Donald Trump, who has faced hand-size jokes since the 1980s heyday of Spy magazine. When the team is done, an iPhone looks like an iPad in the teeny hands they've created. Gotta hand it to them.