Apple noted that its advanced digital compositing software Shake served a crucial role in developing the special effects used in :The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King." It's the seventh consecutive year that Shake been used in an Oscar-winning movie, said Apple.

Apple's Shake 3 software provides an array of compositing and visual effects capabilities like layering, tracking, rotoscoping, painting and color correction. The software is widely used in professional video and film post-production and is commonly taught in film schools as well.

Shake was used on all three Lord of the Rings movies, and has also been used on other visual effects-heavy motion pictures like X2 and The Matrix Revolution. Shake's use in the Lord of the Rings trilogy earned kudos from Joe Letteri, visual effects supervisor at Weta Digital, the studio that produced the effects for that movie series.

"We could not have done 'The Lord of the Rings' trilogy without Shake’s fast compositing speed, quality and extensibility. Shake was the cornerstone of our visual compositing pipeline," said Letteri.

Apple explained that Weta Digital used Shake to blend visual effects components like live action set passes, digital characters and creatures, set extensions and digital environments.

"The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" won a total of 11 Academy Awards at last night's ceremony, tying "Titanic" and "Ben-Hur" for the most awards won by a movie in a single year and the first movie since The Last Emperor to win every Oscar it was nominated for. The movie won for Best Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Editing, Art Direction, Costume Design, Makeup, Score, Song, Sound and Visual Effects.

This story, "Apple: Oscar-winning Return of the King used Shake" was originally published by PCWorld .