Joe Farrell, a visual effects artist who has worked in the MCU, breaks down how he thinks some of Moon Knight's trippy mirror shots were filmed.
Joe Farrell, a visual effects supervisor at Marvel, explains how he thinks the Moon Knight VFX artists accomplished a tricky mirror shot. Created by Jeremy Slater for Disney+, Moon Knight focuses on a man with dissociative identity disorder played by Oscar Isaac who is coping with mysteries regarding his own life and Egyptian gods. Since Moon Knight involves an abundance of many magical elements, the show, like most MCU projects, heavily features computer graphics.
The VFX team on Moon Knight uses a combination of practical effects and CG for the show’s visual language. There are many effective uses of CG in Moon Knight , but some fans have critiqued the show for having effects that are noticeably clunky or poorly-rendered, especially during the fight scenes. Despite these critiques, the VFX team still pulled off some very tricky visuals. When either Marc or Steven (two identities portrayed by Isaac) are controlling their body, the other communicates with them through reflections. So there have to be many shots of Isaac giving two different performances within the same shot.
Related: Why Moon Knight's CG Is Much Worse Than Other MCU Shows
Farrell, a Marvel VFX artist known for his work on Shang-Chi , is featured in a Corridor Crew YouTube video in which he discusses how one of the effects in Moon Knight was accomplished. The scene Farrell breaks down involves a surreal mirror effect in which Isaac as Steven is looking into a reflective bus window while his reflection (Marc) is moving independently of him. Farrell explains that while mirror effects are common and relatively easily achieved through overlaying footage, this shot was much more challenging than most because it involved the camera moving through space, so the filmmakers had to figure out how to maintain the effect in a non-static shot.
According to Farrell, the crew likely filmed Isaac’s non-mirrored performance as Steven first on a bus on set, however, Isaac was not actually looking at a glass window but through an empty panel instead. Then, they shot Isaac as Marc on a solid black Duvetyne (a cloth used for similar purposes as a green screen) and calculated where exactly the camera angle and movement would need to be in order to match up with the first shot. In order to maintain a focused shot, the camera operators would have to calculate not the distance between the camera and Isaac himself, but the distance between Isaac and where the “glass” would be. Then, the shots were overlaid in a similar manner to traditional mirror shots, and the “reflections” of the background were digitally added later.
While Farrell himself didn't work on Moon Knight , his ample experience creating similar kinds of effects means he has a good handle on how these sorts of shots are created in MCU movies. Farrell points out that the scene with the bus likely involved very similar techniques to the famous Shang-Chi bus scene, which he worked on. While it’s still up in the air whether there will be a Moon Knight season 2, hopefully, if it is renewed, there will be more scenes like this one in which the graphics add to the story seamlessly.
Next: Moon Knight's Marc Spector and Alters Explained
Alana (she/her) is a Movie/TV News Writer for Screen Rant. She's currently pursuing an MFA in creative writing at NYU. Alana loves all kinds of movies and TV ranging from Miyazaki movies to New Girl.