Lucasfilm Ltd. congratulates the diligent and dedicated people recognized by these nominations. They are indicative of the hundreds of hard-working, talented people involved in every aspect of production for Episode I.
The artists and craftspeople recognized for excellence:
Visual Effects:
Testament to the unprecedented scale of visual effects in this latest Star Wars chapter, The Phantom Menace had four visual effects supervisors.
Rob Coleman supervised the life-like character animation for digital stars like Watto, Jar Jar Binks and Sebulba as well as dozens of other computer-generated creatures and droids.
John Knoll handled the high-octane Podrace sequence, the end space battle over Naboo and supervised plate shoots during principal photography.
Dennis Muren supervised the creation of the watery depths of Naboo, and the epic ground battles between the Gungans and the Trade Federation Battle Droids.
Scott Squires oversaw the difficult compositing challenges of Coruscant's virtual sets, including the Galactic Senate sequence, and the climactic Theed Generator lightsaber duel.
Sound:
The quality of sound has always been important to all Lucasfilm productions. The fantasy of Episode I's images were well supported by a realistic and vital sound track provided by production mixer John Midgley, Gary Rydstrom, Tom Johnson, and Shawn Murphy.
Sound Effects Editing:
Creating and editing the vast library of sounds to complement the live-action and visual effects images onscreen were the tasks of supervising sound editors Ben Burtt and Tom Bellfort and their crew.
The films of the classic Star Wars trilogy were nominated for a total of 20 Academy Awards, and took home 10 Oscars.
The 72nd Annual Academy Awards airs on March 26, 2000, at 5:00 p.m. Pacific, on ABC.
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