"The cutting-edge look really creates a kind of superreality - it enables audiences to make a leap and say, 'All right, I'm going into a movie now,'" says Jude Law, who stars as the title hero in "Sky Captain," a can-do 1939 pilot who saves the world from a mysterious villain and giant mechanical monsters.

Law and his co-stars, including Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie, were added into the movie after they'd filmed their scenes against a blue screen (the blank background that provides the canvas for movie effects). Director Kerry Conran then added their scenes into the computerized visuals he'd been working on for almost 10 years.

The look is a seamless mix of up-to-the-minute video-game-style action, comic-book panels, photorealism and the sky-high imagination of 1930s action serials.

From: Pretty as a Pixel

Pictures and captions from NY Times
Paramount Pictures
1. SKETCHING IT OUT

As in traditional filmmaking, hand-drawn storyboards are used to guide the composition of a shot. This one was created in April 2002 as production began at a warehouse studio in Van Nuys, Calif. Look out, Polly, there's one behind you!

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2. FLESHING IT OUT

The next step was this computer-animated version of the storyboard, called an animatic. Animatics serve as a rough draft for the animators, but they're also useful to the actors. With no set or robotic invaders to orient her, Gwyneth Paltrow could get a sense of the scene from the animatic.

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3. GET ME PALTROW

Ms. Paltrow, costumed in Polly's slouchy hat and girl-reporter coat, acted the scene in front of a blue screen. The colored points of light behind her are "trackers," used to position her within the frame. She and the other actors were shot on high-definition digital film.

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4. GET ME BUILDINGS

The animators combined photographs of actual New York City structures with computer-generated elements to create the streetscape, leaving space for the robot legs. The marquee features a little in-joke: "Wuthering Heights," another Olivier film — one he made while alive.

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5. GET ME ROBOT

The giant robots, inspired by both the Bauhaus aesthetic and early D.C. Comics, typify the movie's retro look. First the drawings were embellished with color, shadowing and other detail. Then a finishing process known as rendering gave them their photographic realism.

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6. NEARLY THERE

The animators combined Ms. Paltrow and the computer elements in a composited black-and-white frame. Although the film is in color, it was initially conceived for black-and-white, and this step allowed the animators to approach the frame as a composition of light and shadow.

Paramount Pictures
7. PUTTING IT TOGETHER

Drawing from the color in the live-action and animated components, the animators tinted the sequence, using a process similar to the one used to colorize old movies. Each scene in the film was given a distinct palette. For this, the filmmakers chose a muted, almost monochromatic scheme, to evoke the dark urban mood.