A crucial collaborator in the production of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Stan Winston is the renowned special effects make-up and animatronics wizard who brought to life James Cameron’s vision of an eponymous assassin from the future in The Terminator and went on to win two Academy Awards for Best Make-Up and Best Visual Effects for his groundbreaking work in T2: Judgment Day. "Stan Winston is a genius," declares Arnold Schwarzenegger. "He is able to visualize things that you or I never could. Like a painter, he can take his vision and bring it to life in the most incredible way. His work in Terminator 3 will blow people’s minds once again."
Producer Andy Vajna concurs: "Stan is a very imaginative engineer who has the ability to meld emotion with mechanical precision, so while his robotic characters seem very human-like, they’re chillingly scary."
"I take great pride in my role in bringing the Terminator to life," says Winston, also known for his innovative contributions to the Jurassic Park film series and, most recently, his acclaimed work in A.I. Artificial Intelligence. "I very much wanted to be involved in bringing the character back for the third film, and I was excited by the challenge of creating the new Terminators, the T-X and the T-1."
Throughout the design and production processes, Winston’s team of 150 artists at Stan Winston Studios pushed the limits of robotic and animatronic technologies. "In the first Terminator film, we depicted the T-101’s naked endoskeleton through simple puppetry and minimal animatronics," he recalls. "For T2, we advanced our robotics and animatronics to create some extremely intricate puppets that replicated the liquid metal-based T-1000, which were then married with CG [computer graphics] effects. For Terminator 3, we created robotic technology beyond any in the world, in terms of movement and control, including NASA. So this film series has advanced our technology, and our technology has advanced the series."
Director Jonathan Mostow worked closely with Winston to develop the look of the T-1, the predecessor to the T-101 model played by Schwarzenegger. "I wanted to depict the first generation of Terminator robots, to show where it all began," Mostow explains. "So we asked ourselves what kind of weaponry would it have? What sort of sight system and articulated parts would it have? How would it move? We came up with this primitive but deadly robotic machine that is part tank, part robot."
Once the overall look and functions of the T-1 were determined, it was up to Winston’s team to determine how to construct five of these hydraulically-controlled devices that roll on tank-like treads; have complete range of motion including head, neck, eye and arm movement; and control over their built-in gun turrets. After a final three-dimensional design of the T-1 was rendered via computer, the cosmetic parts of the T-1s were milled by computer-controlled machines and then sculpted, sanded and detailed by hand.
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