For 13 years, audiences worldwide waited for James Cameron to deliver the next installment in his epic original franchise, Avatar. And, for 13 years, the record of 10 nominations the first movie set in the Visual Effects Society awards stood strong. But with that next installment's release in December, its predecessor's record has finally been broken... no, not broken, but smashed. Avatar: The Way of Water earns a whopping 14 nominations for the 2022 VES awards - there are only nine categories in which it's eligible, and it appears in all nine at least once. To put its dominance into perspective: no other movie scores more than five nominations, and no other live action movie scores more than three. The Way of Water indeed! Winners will be announced on 15 February.
Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature
Avatar: The Way of Water (Richard Baneham, Walter Garcia, Joe Letteri, Eric Saindon and J. D. Schwalm)
The Batman (Russell Earl, Anders Langlands, Dan Lemmon, Bryan Searing and Dominic Tuohy)
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (Benjamin Loch, Christian Manz, Stephane Naze, Alistair Williams and Olly Young)
Jurassic World: Dominion (Paul Corbould, Jance Rubinchik, Ann Podlozny, Dan Snape and David Vickery)
Top Gun: Maverick (Scott Fisher, Seth Hill, Bryan Litson, Paul Molles and Ryan Tudhope)
Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature
Death on the Nile (Jonathan Bowen, Claudia Dehmel, George Murphy, Mathieu Raynault and David Watkins)
The Fabelmans (Aleksei Chernogorod, Mark Hawker, Pablo Helman, Jeff Kalmus and Jennifer Mizener)
The Gray Man (Swen Gilbert, Bryan Grill, Viet Luu, Michael Meinardus and Cliff Welsh)
The Pale Blue Eye (Jake Braver, Catherine Farrell, Jeremy Hays, Scott Pritchard and Tim van Horn)
Thirteen Lives (Denis Baudin, Jason Billington, Brian Cox, Michael Harrison and Thomas Horton)
Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Tim Field, Don Libby, Paul Norris and Andrew Simmonds)
Outstanding Visual Effects in an Animated Feature
The Bad Guys (Matt Baer, Pierre Perifel, Damon Ross and J. P. Sans)
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (Cameron Carson, Emma Gorbey, Jeffrey Schaper and Aaron Weintraub)
Mad God (Tom Gibbons, Chris Morley, Ken Rogerson and Phil Tippett)
The Sea Beast (Joshua Beveridge, Stirling Duguid, Christian Hejnal and Spencer Lueders)
Strange World (Laurie Au, Steve Goldberg, Mark Hammel and Mehrdad Isvandi)
Turning Red (Lindsey Collins, Danielle Feinberg, Dave Hale and Shi Do Mee)
Outstanding Special (Practical) Effects in a Photoreal Project
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'Current machine and wave pool' (Nick Rand, J. D. Schwalm, Richie Schwalm and Robert Spurlock)
Black Adam - 'Robotic fight' (Andrew Hyde, Nick Rand, Andy Robot and J. D. Schwalm)
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: 'Adrift' - 'Middle Earth storm' (Dean Clarke, Oliver Gee, Eliot Naimie and Mark Robson)
Mad God (Webster Colcord, Johnny McLeod, Chris Morley and Phil Tippett)
Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a CG Project
ABBA: Voyage (Paolo Acri, Jose Burgos, Par M. Ekberg and John Galloway)
Avatar: The Way of Water (Richard Baneham, A. J. Briones, Dan Cox and Eric Reynolds)
The Batman - 'Rain soaked car chase' (Ben Bigiel, Jason Desjarlais, Michael J. Hall and Dennis Yoo)
Prehistoric Planet (Daniel Fotheringham, Claire Hill, Hsu Wei Chuan and Krzysztof Szczepanski)
Outstanding Composition and Lighting in a Feature
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'Landing rockets forest destruction' (Maria Corcho, Miguel Santana da Silva, Geng Hong Fei and Jonathan Moulin)
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'Water integration' (Sam Cole, Jean Matthews, Florian Schroeder and Francois Sugny)
The Batman - 'Rainy freeway chase' (Rachel E. Herbert, Eva Snyder, Stephen Tong and Beck Veitch)
Top Gun: Maverick (Saul Davide Galbiati, Felix B. Lafontaine, Cynthia Rodriguez del Castillo and Jean-Frederic Veilleux)
Outstanding Model in a Photoreal or Animated Project
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'The sea dragon' (Ian Baker, Guillaume Francois, Sam Sharplin and Stephan Skorepa)
The Sea Beast (Susan Kornfeld, Edward Lee, Maxx Okazaki and Doug Smith)
Top Gun: Maverick - 'F-14 Tomcat' (Peter Dominik, Aram Jung, Klaudio Ladavac and Christian Peck)
Wendell & Wild - 'Dream Faire' (Nicholas Blake, Peter Dahmen and Paul Harrod)
Outstanding Created Environment in a Photoreal Feature
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'Metkayina Village' (Ryan Arcus, Lisa Hardisty, Paul Harris and David Kim Tae Hyoung)
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'The reef' (Joe W. Churchill, Jessica Cowley, Alex Nowotny and Justin Stockton)
Jurassic World: Dominion - 'Biosyn Valley' (Thomas Dohlen, Steven Ellis, Steve Hardy and John Seru)
Slumberland - 'The Wondrous Cuban Hotel dream' (Marc Austin, Casey Gorton, Pavan Rajesh Uppu and Daniel Dimitri Veder)
Outstanding Created Environment in an Animated Feature
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio - 'In the stomach of a sea monster' (Quinn Carvalho, Javier Gonzalez Alonso, Warren Lawtey and Anjum Sakharkar)
Lightyear - 'T'Kani Prime forest' (Lenora Acidera, Amy Allen, Alyssa Minko and Jose L. Ramos Serrano)
The Sea Beast - 'The hunting ship' (Bang Yo Han, Denil George Chundangal, Enoch Ihde and John Wallace)
Strange World - 'The Windy Jungle' (Jesse Erickson, Benjamin Fiske, Hong Ki Jong and Ryan Smith)
Wendell & Wild - 'The Scream Fair' (Colin Babcock, Nicholas Blake, Matthew Paul Albertus Cross and Tom Proost)
Outstanding Effects Simulations in a Photoreal Feature
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'Fire and destruction' (Ole Geir Eidsheim, David Kirchner, Miguel Perez Senent and Xavier Martin Ramirez)
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'Water simulations' (David Caeiro Cebrian, Nicholas Illingworth, David Moraton and Johnathan M. Nixon)
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever - 'City street flooding' (Alexis Hall, Matthew Hanger, Yang Hang and Mikel Zuloaga)
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (Hirai Toyokazu, Jesse Parker Holmes, Rob Richardson and Grayden Solman)
Outstanding Effects Simulations in an Animated Feature
Lightyear (Alexis Angelidis, Chris Chapman, Kim Jung Hyun and Keith Klohn)
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (Derek Cheung, Juang Jin Guang, Michael Losure and Ong Kiem Ching)
The Sea Beast (Brian D. Casper, Joe Eckroat, Dmitriy Kolesnik and Spencer Lueders)
Strange World (Deborah Carlson, Stuart Griese, Yasser Hamed and Scott Townsend)
Outstanding Animated Character in a Photoreal Feature
Avatar: The Way of Water - 'Kiri' (Guillaume Francois, Anneka Fris, Hwang Jung Roc and Rebecca Louise Leybourne)
Beast - 'Lion' (Alvise Avati, Krzysztof Boyoko, Chris McGaw and Bora Sahin)
Pinocchio - 'Honest John' (Armita Khanlarpour, Kim Kyoung Min, Christophe Paradis and Valentina Rosselli)
Slumberland - 'Pig' (Martine Chartrand, Victor Dinis, Fernando Lopes Herrera and Lucie Martinetto)
Outstanding Animated Character in an Animated Feature
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio - 'Geppetto' (Noel Estevez-Baker, Charles Greenfield, Shami Lang-Rinderspacher and Peter Saunders)
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio - 'Pinocchio' (Oliver Beale, Brian Leif Hansen, Richard Pickersgill and Kim Slate)
Strange World - 'Splat' (Cameron Black, Leticia Gillett, Louis Jones and Dan Lipson)
Turning Red - 'Panda Mei' (Christopher Bolwyn, Ethan Dean, Bill Sheffler and Yokoo Kureha)
Outstanding Visual Effects in a Student Project
Boom (Gabriel Augerai, Romain Augier, Charles di Cicco and Laurie Pereira de Figueiredo)
A Calling. From the Desert to the Sea (Mario Bertsch, Lukas Loffler, Max Pollmann and Till Sander-Titgemeyer)
Macula (Hady Abou Ghazale, Jules Machicot, Lothaire Rialhe and Marta Rodriguez-Noriega Nava)
Maronii (Dimitri Allonneau, Maxime Guitet, Ngoc Mai Nguyen and Lucas Plata)
Emerging Technology Award
Avatar: The Way of Water - Depth Comp (Benny Edlund, Joshua Hardgrave, Dejan Mamcilovic and Tobias B. Schmidt)
Avatar: The Way of Water - Facial System (Stuart Adcock, Choi Byung Kuk, Stephen Cullingford and Marco Revelant)
Avatar: The Way of Water - Water Toolset (Alexey Dmitrievich Stomakhin, Steve Lesser, Douglas McHale and Sven Joel Wretborn)
Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio - 3D Printed Metal Armature (Brian Leif Hansen, Richard Pickersgill, Peter Saunders and Glen Southern)
Turning Red - Profile Mover and CurveNets (Gernando de Goes, Kurt Fleischer and Bill Sheffler)