Human acts apes in "War for the Planet of the Apes"

Chinese director Lu Chuan poses for a photo with Anders Langlands as the special effects wizard talks about the motion capture technology employed by his team in "War for the Planet of the Apes," which is due for release in China on Sept 15, 2017. [Photo: China Plus]

"War for the Planet of the Apes", a Hollywood summer blockbuster, will be released in China in mid-September.

Before the film's arrival in Chinese theatres, Weta Digital Visual Effects Supervisor Anders Langlands recently visited Beijing, sharing the secrets of how his team made the stunning scenes based on their visits to a local zoo.

"For the motion to be believable, we also need to simulate dynamics. The muscles in the flex and jiggle under tension, skin on fat slide around over it and then the fur blows around in the wind. We like to simulate all of these processes from inside out. We're lucky enough to have very good relationship with Wellington Zoo, where key chimpanzees, they became to share their MRI scan data with us. And we can use that to build a 3D model of the inside of a chimpanzee. And this tells us all about the position, the size and the density of the muscles, it tells us where they attach the bone with the ligaments, and it helps us figure out how everything articulates together."

In the movie, real actors step into the roles of apes.

There are 1,440 visual effects shots in "War for the Planet of the Apes" representing 95 percent of the total shots of the movie.

Langlands has credits in many major blockbusters including "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1" and "Clash of the Titans."

His work on "X-Men: Days of Future Past" earned him a BAFTA nomination, and in 2016 he was nominated for Best Visual Effects at the Academy Awards for his work on "The Martian."

"War for the Planet of the Apes" is due for release in China on September 15th.