The Schufftan Process

In the early 1900s cinema was undergoing a major evolution in respect to its growing reliance on “movie magic“. The newly developed tricks of George Melies (Journey to the moon), F.W. Murnau (Nosferatu), and Paul Wegener (The Golem) started to show how special effects could be used to support and enhance a narrative. These new effects were creating new and more intense feelings of fear and terror in the audience adding a never before known dynamic to film. New visual effects allowed for new perspectives and a fresh way of storytelling. And even more dramatic developments were still to come before the end of the decade.
Though the effects of Murnau, Wegener, and Melies were interesting, it was Fritz Lang who truly revolutionized the use of large-scale special effects. Fritz Lang in his movie Metropolis was the first to employ what was called the Schufftan Process, invented by the German cinematographer Eugen Schufftan (1893 – 1977).
Schufftan began his career as an expressionist painter and an architect (Wikipedia). He evetually became interested in the camera’s technology and developing new techniques which soon brought him to the jobs of cameraman and cinematographer, the latter of which he won an Academy Award for in 1961’s The Hustler. (www.imdb.com)
Though an acclaimed cinemotographer Schufftan is perhaps best known for his development of the Schufftan process. The Process was used heavily in the early days of filmmaking before the creation of matte paintings and blue screen effects. Schufftan essentially used silver backed mirror to combine a scale drawing, or miniature, of a scene with a specially placed stage containing actors in appropriate positions. By tracing the outline of the stage and the actors within it onto a mirror and then removing part of the reflective surface, he had masked out part of the stage and replaced it with the miniature scale drawing, combining the two into a single scene that could not easily be discerned by the audience once filmed.
Many filmmakers, such as Alfred Hitchcock In his movie Blackmail, made use of this technique until it was soon replaced by the creation of matte shots, which were much more efficient and easier to create. The schufftan process would take time to set up because everything had to be aligned perfectly in order for it to be believable. But while it was in use it helped to create some masterpieces of early cinema. Metropolis perhaps never would have achieved the level of acclaim it has without the help of the Schufftan process, and Hitchcock’s famous British Museum scene in Blackmail never have been realized. Though only short lived as a cinema effect it made it’s impact and influence on the visual effects industry