Matte painting

Matte painting is kind of like drawing a really cool picture that can be used in movies and television shows. Imagine you're watching a superhero movie, and there's a scene where the hero is standing on top of a tall building, looking out across the city. But in real life, it might be too expensive or too dangerous to film the scene on a real building, so they use matte painting instead.

Here's how it works: An artist first draws or paints a picture of the city skyline, including all the buildings, streets, and other details. This picture is usually very large, like a giant poster or even a wall-sized mural. Once the artist is done, they take a photograph of their artwork and turn it into a digital file, like a really high-quality picture.

Next, the filmmakers take this digital file and "place" it behind the actor or actress, so it looks like they're standing on top of the building in the picture. Sometimes they add even more details, like birds flying or clouds moving, to make it look even more realistic.

Matte painting is a really important part of making movies and TV shows look amazing, because it allows filmmakers to create scenes that might not be possible in real life. It's kind of like using your imagination to make a picture come to life!