In the 2014 film Beauty and the Beast, the heroine Belle walks onto the balcony of a palace and takes a look below. The houses, streets and citizens form a grand landscape of her fictional kingdom. There is a surprised look in her eyes.
But if you thought the actress playing Belle really saw the scenes portrayed, you are mistaken. What she saw during the shooting was a huge green screen, but the director looking at the camera view would see the complete scene with the actress in it.
Experts showcased this cutting-edge technology to visitors at the opening of the 2015 China 3-D Technology & Creation Expo.
The Franco-German film was used to showcase the screen technology, which is now widely used in movie shooting.
In the past, directors could see the visual effects only after shooting the film, but now technology allows filmmakers to see the virtual scenes as the actors are performing in front of the camera.
The expo, one of the events at the ongoing 2015 Beijing International Cultural & Creative Industry Expo, was held from Tuesday to Saturday.
Regarded as one of the most influential events promoting new technologies, the annual event is organized by the Beijing Council for the Promotion of International Trade, the ICCIE committee and the Chinese Institute of Electronics.
"Most of the technologies shown at the expo are open to the public the first time, and represent the highest level of the Chinese film industry," said Sha Jinfei, executive director of the China Science Writers' Association, at the opening ceremony.
China's movie industry has seen quick development in the past five years.
Latest figures show that in the first three quarters of this year the industry grossed a record box office revenue of 33 billion yuan ($5.2 billion), up 50.39 percent year on year.
Domestic movies brought in 19.755 billion yuan, accounting for nearly 60 percent of market share, according to the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television.
The growth of the industry has boosted the development of film technologies, but despite the growing number of local professionals the industry has found it hard to scale the heights attained by powerful Hollywood rivals, industry sources say.
While visual effects professionals may see commercial opportunities in the new technologies displayed at the expo, for ordinary movie enthusiasts this is a good place to discover the secrets of the industry.
Models of animals－the same size as real ones－were seen at the stand of Newmx Workshop, a Beijing-based company making film props.
Ma Bo, the publicity manager of Newmx Workshop, tells China Daily that the firm had made mechanical animals such as horses, ostriches and wolves for at least a dozen big-budget homegrown titles.
Speaking of the use of artificial animals in the films, Ma says: "Some of the battle scenes need horses to fall abruptly to the ground, or have their legs chopped of by sharp weapons. It's really hard and dangerous to make real horses perform such stunts.
"Considering the safety and health of the animals, film crews usually use artificial stand-ins, which can be controlled using remotes."
In addition to those controlled by remotes, some artificial animals are controlled by human actors, Ma says.
A 2-meter-tall ostrich made for the Feng Xiaogang-starrer Mr Six is on display.
Visitors can see a hole in its belly, which allows an actor to squeeze in and move with it.
"The actor wears a green screen costume and the computer program will cut him out during the post-production process. The ostrich looks real while running down a Beijing street," Ma says.
Other highlights included 3-D printed film props and motion capture technology, a way to digitally record human movements.