Lawrence W. Butler

Special effects for motion pictures the process was a complex and time consuming once known as "traveling matte" prior to the introduction of digital compositing. The blue screen and traveling matte method were developed in the 1930s at RKO Radio Pictures and other studios, and were used to create special effects for The Thief of Bagdad (1940). At RKO, Linwood Dunn used traveling matte to create "wipes" - where there were transitions like a windshield wiper in films such as Flying Down to Rio (1933). The credit for development of the blue screen is given to Larry Butler, who won the Academy Award for special effects for The Thief of Bagdad. He had invented the blue screen and traveling matte technique in order to achieve the visual effects which were unprecedented in 1940. He was also the first special effects man to have created these effects in Technicolor, which was in its infancy at the time. In 1950, Warner Brothers employee and ex-Kodak researcher Arthur Widmer began working on an ultra violet traveling matte process. He also began developing bluescreen techniques: one of the first films to use them was the 1958 adaptation of the Ernest Hemingway novella, The Old Man and the Sea, starring Spencer Tracy.