Miniature
work This work was handled during three months post-production
in Detroit by Gary Jones' Acme Effects
and Tom Hitchcock's Illuminations Effects.
The work
included:
- the construction of the minature cabin - (Pic.4)
- the attack on the cabin by possessed trees during the films climax
- the time-warp vortex
- the possessed bridge that blocks off Ash's escape route - (Pic.
5)
Jones provided
the gelatin exploding head of the flying Deadite seen at the films
climax
The shots were
achieved on a budget of just $35,000. However detailed the work might
look Jones later described his disappointment at the footage used
in the final film, "We put 2000% into making some serious
effects. When we saw what Sam [Raimi] was doing, we realised he
was after a campy comedy and not the horror of the first movie."
Jones
went on to describe the intentions for the minature trees attacking
the cabin which were only meant to be glimpsed very briefly, "After three
seconds the trees begin to look fake."
Dino
DeLaurentiis, the films producer, requested that more shots of the
attacking be inserted after he saw the raw cut of the movie.
Stop-motion
effects To
tackle the films various creature requirements in a pre-CGI era
Raimi turned to veteran animator Doug Beswick and old friend and
Evil Dead contributor Tom Sullivan. Beswick would design and sculpt
the "Rotten-apple head" or
fully possessed Henrietta monster based on KNB Efx's Henrietta puppet
head used for the fight sequences with Ash near the films conclusion.
Sullivan
was brought on board and contributed in the following way: - animating the prologue to the movie featuring the 'Book
of the Dead' , skeltal creatures and a 'whirlwind
vortex' effect
- to design and animate the flying Deadite seen briefly at the films
climax
(Pic.6)
- he also designed an unused effect for the time-travel
sequence that involved eye-balls hurling past Ash
"Flying
Deadite" - (Pic. 6) Raimi asked Sullivan to make the creature in the style
of the Harpies seen in Ray Harryhausen's Jason and the Argonauts.
The creature model was animated against a blue-screen background
with the intention of printing the live action and stop-motion together.
The creature was intended to be used as part of a much larger sequence
but Sullivan was not on hand to supervise the filming of the background
plates on location. "The background
plates were virtually useless due to all the dust in the air." said Sullivan.
