"Squid Game" Season 1 doesn't seem all that packed with CGI, but it actually took more digital wizardry to pull off the dystopian smash hit than you might think.
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00:00Squid Game Season 1 doesn't seem all that packed with CGI, but it actually took more
00:05digital wizardry to pull off the dystopian smash hit than you might think.
00:10The cast and crew didn't actually have to worry about being killed during the infamous
00:14Red Light, Green Light challenge, but the filming of this sequence wasn't exactly a
00:17walk in the park, either. In addition to the major cast members, there were also 300 extras
00:23and 20 martial arts actors on the set. The initial script originally envisioned 1,000
00:28characters, but creator Hwang Dong-hyuk quickly realized that this wasn't viable. While 300
00:34is a lot less than 1,000, the scene was still a nightmare to orchestrate.
00:38Since some of the violent deaths were shot in slow motion, it was all too easy for actors
00:41to mess up a take and then have to start over. As Hwang recalled to Vanity Fair,
00:46"...it took about 20 to 30 minutes if we got a wrong take and had to plant the fake blood
00:50in them again."
00:51Whenever this happened, Hwang would go to a different part of the set and film another
00:55character's death while the crew cleaned up the fake blood and got the initial actor back
00:58into position. With such a complicated set piece, they couldn't afford to waste a second.
01:04One particular shot in the Red Light, Green Light sequence was especially tricky to film.
01:08The moment when Ali grabs Gi-hun to keep him from falling, it wasn't easy for the actors
01:12to hold that awkward position, nor was it comfortable. It was also pretty much physically
01:17impossible.
01:18Furthermore, the wire lifted Lee Jung-jae's shirt unnaturally, so not only did the effects
01:32team have to edit out the wire in post-production, they also needed to tweak Gi-hun's uniform,
01:37otherwise it would have been painfully obvious that there was a wire underneath.
01:42Many of the locations in Squid Game were constructed in real life, with the production crew building
01:46everything from the bunk beds to the arena for the marbles game. However, that doesn't
01:51mean that these scenes didn't require computer-generated imagery, as the VFX team still needed to
01:56extend the sets digitally.
01:57We did a lot of computer graphics work at the post-production stages to connect different
02:02spaces and to create the space that wasn't able to be created in reality."
02:07For example, the background of the tug-of-war room was digitally modified to make the area
02:11seem even more cavernous than it actually was. The effects team did, indeed, build the
02:15tug-of-war platforms, but the actors weren't very high off the ground, save for a handful
02:19of shots of the players being pulled over the edge. Likewise, while the crew did construct
02:23a segment of the room with all the stairs, they used CGI to extend the set and make it
02:28seem like the stairs went spiraling deep into the ground.
02:32The painted background of the red-light-green-light arena is actually CGI, which might sound strange
02:37considering that it could have easily been built physically. So why did the VFX team
02:41go through the trouble of using a blue screen instead of just painting the wall? To put
02:45it simply, Hwang Dong-hyuk hadn't made up his mind yet when the sets were built, so
02:49CGI was utilized to give him the option to change the design later.
02:52At first, Hwang considered making the arena walls more colorful. However, visual effects
02:57supervisor Chong Jae-hoon had a different idea. As he explained in an interview with
03:01the Visual Effects Society,
03:02"...maybe we should have a buffer zone for the first episode, because if we just go all
03:06out on the colorful and the flashy from the very beginning, people might find it childish."
03:10Jae-hoon also likened the sets to The Truman Show, and how that movie's artificial world
03:15seems almost but not quite real. Ultimately, the final design that Hwang settled on was
03:20a backdrop that was just real enough to be convincing, and just fake enough to feel unsettling.
03:25"...I tried to create a space that would confuse the dead and the living."
03:33The trippy game arenas weren't the only sets brought to life with VFX, as the environments
03:38outside the games also required some digital magic. For example, the famous overhead shot
03:42of the island at the end of the first episode would have looked very different without visual
03:46effects. The massive arena with a retractable roof was actually filmed on a modest patch
03:51of land that only contained a couple of warehouses, while the rest was added digitally. Likewise,
03:57the sequence where the cars leave the ferry and enter the island is not what it appears
04:01to be. As Chong Jae-hoon explained,
04:03"...people think that it was actually filmed on an island, but it was just like a really
04:06random part of Korea."
04:08In this landlocked filming location, the crew took advantage of an existing waterway and
04:12then added the rest with CGI. And believe it or not, the entire airport from the season
04:16finale is fake. The original plan was to film that scene in a real airport, but that wasn't
04:21possible due to COVID-19 restrictions. So instead, it was shot in the studio, and computer
04:26wizardry transformed it into an airport.
04:30For Hwang Dong-hyuk, the safety of his cast and crew were of the utmost importance. So
04:34when it came time to film the grisly player eliminations, he took extra safety precautions
04:39for any scenes involving guns. And in some cases, even the sounds of the gunfire were
04:43fake. So while Hwang did shoot some of the death scenes with realistic gunfire sound
04:47effects, there were other times when he just shouted.
04:50PUNCH!
04:51Each time Hwang did this, Lee Jung-jae and the other actress flinched as if they heard
04:56a real gunshot. If we were in their shoes, we'd probably flinch, too.
05:01Squid Game's tug-of-war scene was so draining that the actors had to catch their breath
05:04between takes, with some of them resting on the short yellow rail at the edge of the platform.
05:09Meanwhile, Lee Jung-jae had a little stool that he would pull up. Most of the actors
05:13agreed that the tug-of-war sequence was the hardest to film.
05:16We don't usually do tug-of-war, but it actually requires a lot of physical strength.
05:23While filming this sequence, the actors were actually competing against a special machine
05:27designed to pull on the rope. As Lee You-mi explained to The Swoon,
05:30we were really using all of our strength to play against a machine,
05:33not a group of people, so no matter how hard we pulled, we couldn't win.
05:38You'll probably be relieved to learn that most of the Glass Stepping Stones challenge
05:42was actually filmed close to the ground. The set was still 1.5 meters, or approximately
05:475 feet, off the ground, which allowed the crew to film shots from underneath the glass bridge,
05:51as well as stage the shots where characters fell to their deaths.
05:54Behind-the-scenes footage shows one extra leaping onto the space where a glass panel should be,
05:59except that there's no glass. Instead, there's a platform that was later erased by VFX that drops
06:05quickly and smoothly the moment she puts her weight on it. After it fell, she crouched down
06:09to make sure her body would no longer appear in the shot. Even though the bridge wasn't as high
06:13in real life as it appears in the final version, it was still plenty convincing for the actors.
06:24Unsurprisingly, this set actually scared some of the show's stars.
06:35Not every Squid Game scene was filmed from a comfortable height. For a handful of shots in
06:40the glass bridge sequence, the actors actually filmed on a separate set that was approximately
06:456 meters, or about 19 feet, off the ground. The VFX team later composited the two sets digitally.
06:51Behind-the-scenes footage shows Min-Yeo and Dok-Soo being raised on a harness,
06:55along with the glassmaker taking a tumble from the glass bridge.
07:02Even from the safety of the editing room, the footage from these scenes gave editor Nam Na
07:06Young a case of vertigo. To convey the scale and the stakes of this game, the crew also built a
07:11third set just for filming all the broken bodies of the contestants who hit the floor.
07:16To film the unforgettable scene where the glass bridge explodes,
07:19the Squid Game team shot in slow motion with a Phantom camera, which can record at 3,000
07:24frames per second. As a result, the actors had to be very careful not to turn away too soon,
07:30or otherwise the timing wouldn't line up. Between takes, a crew member would come in and make very
07:35precise slashes in the sleeve of Jung Ho-Yeon's uniform so that it would look as though the glass
07:39was cutting her clothes. For the glass itself, it started with a practical effect, as the actors
07:44were sprayed with particles designed to resemble glass. Afterwards, they had to shake these
07:49particles from their hair. Of course, the rest of the bridge exploding was shot separately. At first,
07:54the visual effects team tried shooting it practically, but they weren't happy with
07:57that result, so they opted instead for a CGI explosion. As CG supervisor Kang Moon-Jung told
08:03the Visual Effects Society,
08:05A lot of people thought that CG can never be better than the real shot. But actually,
08:09for this sequence, CG turned out to be even better than the real shot.
08:12But that didn't exactly mean it was easy, as the visual effects team had to erase and
08:17replace the reflections in every single glass shard.
08:21One of the most intense Squid Game sequences is the final contest, in which Gi-Hun and Sang-Woo
08:26fight to the death. It was filmed in the same location as the red light, green light sequence,
08:31yet the set couldn't look more different. The lighting is more overcast, and the crew used
08:35sprinklers to simulate a heavy downpour. The camera crew wore ponchos and used waterproof
08:40coverings to keep their equipment from getting wet. However, the actors weren't so lucky. They
08:44had to shoot an intense fight scene while they were soaking wet, and it was freezing outside.
08:49As Lee Jung-Jae recalled to Entertainment Weekly,
08:51It was in winter, so the weather was very cold. I remember filming that scene for about four
08:56days in the rain with the sprinkler, so it was very emotionally and physically tough.
09:00I want to end here.
09:02Even some of the most ordinary shots in Squid Game would look different without special effects.
09:07For instance, the ceilings of most of the arenas were inserted digitally after filming.
09:11In the red light, green light arena, the walls of the set were just a bit taller than the blue
09:15screen, meaning they cast shadows on the ground that wouldn't make sense in the final, fully
09:20edited scene. Thus, the VFX team needed to digitally erase some of the shadows. And while
09:25you might think that the giant piggy bank containing all the prize money could be easily
09:29filmed practically, that wasn't actually the case. The crew did build a physical piggy bank,
09:34but then they soon realized that it wouldn't work, as the plexiglass was so reflective that
09:38it was hard to actually make out the money inside when a spotlight was shining on it.
09:42So they created a CG version instead. All of these VFX shots probably slipped under
09:47the radar of most viewers, and that's exactly how the Squid Game team likes it.
09:51As Kang Moon-Jung told the Visual Effects Society,
09:53What director Hwang wanted, and what the VFX crew wanted,
09:57was to not make CG look like CG, so people can just take it for granted.