‘The Lion King,’ ‘The Irishman,’ ‘The Mandalorian’ top Visual Effects Society (VES) winners

Disney’s new version of The Lion King was the big winner at the Visual Effects Society’s awards last night with four wins (of its five nominations), including the top prize: Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature. The all CGI animated film also won Outstanding Created Environment in a Photoreal Feature, Outstanding Created Environment in a Photoreal Feature and Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a CG Project.

The de-aging work in Netflix’s The Irishman earned two important wins, including Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature. It bested fellow OScar nominee 1917 for the win.

Alita: Battle Angel led the nominations and came away with one win, for Outstanding Animated Character in a Photoreal Feature for the film’s title character.

On television, Disney+’s The Mandalorian led the nomination total with six and won two thanks to one of 2019’s biggest pop culture breakthroughs, Baby Yoda. Netflix’s Stranger Things and HBO’s Game of Thrones also each earned two wins.

The VES Lifetime Achievement Award was presented to Martin Scorsese, while Roland Emmerich was honored with the VES Visionary Award. 

Here is the full list of winners.

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature
The Lion King
(Robert Legato, Tom Peitzman, Adam Valdez, Andrew R. Jones)

Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature
The Irishman
(Pablo Helman, Mitchell Ferm, Jill Brooks, Leandro Estebecorena, Jeff Brink)

Outstanding Visual Effects in an Animated Feature
Missing Link
(Brad Schiff, Travis Knight, Steve Emerson, Benoit Dubuc)

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Episode
The Mandalorian; “The Child”
(Richard Bluff, Abbigail Keller, Jason Porter, Hayden Jones, Roy K. Cancion)

Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Photoreal Episode
Chernobyl; “1:23:45”
(Max Dennison, Lindsay McFarlane, Clare Cheetham, Paul Jones, Claudius Christian Rauch)

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Real-Time Project
Control
(Janne Pulkkinen, Elmeri Raitanen, Matti Hämäläinen, James Tottman)

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Commercial
“Hennessy: The Seven Worlds”
(Carsten Keller, Selcuk Ergen, Kiril Mirkov, William Laban)

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Special Venue Project
Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance
(Jason Bayever, Patrick Kearney, Carol Norton, Bill George)

Outstanding Animated Character in a Photoreal Feature
Alita: Battle Angel; Alita
(Michael Cozens, Mark Haenga, Olivier Lesaint, Dejan Momcilovic)

Outstanding Animated Character in an Animated Feature
Missing Link; Susan
(Rachelle Lambden, Brenda Baumgarten, Morgan Hay, Benoit Dubuc)

Outstanding Animated Character in an Episode or Real-Time Project
Stranger Things 3; Tom/Bruce Monster
(Joseph Dubé-Arsenault, Antoine Barthod, Frederick Gagnon, Xavier Lafarge)

Outstanding Animated Character in a Commercial
“Cyberpunk 2077”; Dex
(Jonas Ekman, Jonas Skoog, Marek Madej, Grzegorz Chojnacki)

Outstanding Created Environment in a Photoreal Feature
The Lion King; The Pridelands
(Marco Rolandi, Luca Bonatti, Jules Bodenstein, Filippo Preti)

Outstanding Created Environment in an Animated Feature
Toy Story 4; Antiques Mall
(Hosuk Chang, Andrew Finley, Alison Leaf, Philip Shoebottom)

Outstanding Created Environment in an Episode, Commercial, or Real-Time Project
Game of Thrones; The Iron Throne; Red Keep Plaza
(Carlos Patrick DeLeon, Alonso Bocanegra Martinez, Marcela Silva, Benjamin Ross)

Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a CG Project
The Lion King
(Robert Legato, Caleb Deschanel, Ben Grossmann, AJ Sciutto)

Outstanding Model in a Photoreal or Animated Project
The Mandalorian; The Sin; The Razorcrest
(Doug Chiang, Jay Machado, John Goodson, Landis Fields IV)

Outstanding Effects Simulations in a Photoreal Feature
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
(Don Wong, Thibault Gauriau, Goncalo Cababca, François-Maxence Desplanques)

Outstanding Effects Simulations in an Animated Feature
Frozen 2
(Erin V. Ramos, Scott Townsend, Thomas Wickes, Rattanin Sirinaruemarn)

Outstanding Effects Simulations in an Episode, Commercial, or Real-Time Project
Stranger Things 3; “Melting Tom/Bruce”
(Nathan Arbuckle, Christian Gaumond, James Dong, Aleksandr Starkov)

Outstanding Compositing in a Feature
The Irishman
(Nelson Sepulveda, Vincent Papaix, Benjamin O’Brien, Christopher Doerhoff)

Outstanding Compositing in an Episode
Game of Thrones; “The Long Night”; “Dragon Ground Battle”
(Mark Richardson, Darren Christie, Nathan Abbot, Owen Longstaff)

Outstanding Compositing in a Commercial
“Hennessy: The Seven Worlds”
(Rod Norman, Guillaume Weiss, Alexander Kulikov, Alessandro Granella)

Outstanding Special (Practical) Effects in a Photoreal or Animated Project
The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance; “She Knows All the Secrets”
(Sean Mathiesen, Jon Savage, Toby Froud, Phil Harvey)

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Student Project
The Beauty
(Marc Angele, Aleksandra Todorovic, Pascal Schelbli, Noel Winzen)

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.

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