Editing Mary Poppins (film) (section)

=== Filming ===
[[Principal photography|Filming]] took place between May and September 1963 in Burbank, California;<ref>{{Cite web |title=AFI{{!}}Catalog |url=https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/moviedetails/23290 |access-date=2025-02-08 |website=catalog.afi.com}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=1963-08-11 |title=PERCOLATING 'POPPINS'; Disney Transcribes Classic Childhood Tale for Julie Andrews's Film Debut |url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1963/08/11/89951283.html?pdf_redirect=true&site=false |access-date=2025-02-08 |work=The New York Times |language=en |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>  post-production and animation took another eleven months.{{sfn|Williams|Denney|2004|p=281}}

[[File:Mary Poppins9.jpg|thumb|right|Actor Dick Van Dyke was inserted into an animated scene of dancing penguins using the [[sodium vapor process]].]]
The scene in which Mary Poppins and Bert interact with a group of animated penguins is noted for its use of the [[sodium vapor process]]. Rather than using the more common [[Chroma key|bluescreen]] process to insert the actors into the animated footage, the actors were filmed against a white screen lit with sodium vapor lights, which have a yellow hue. A special camera was fitted with a prism that filtered this light to a separate reel of film, creating a highly accurate matte that could be used to isolate the actors from the background. This created a crisp, clean image and even allowed the partially transparent veil of Mary Poppins's costume to let through light from the background. The film received the [[Academy Award for Best Visual Effects]] in 1965 for this effect.<ref>{{cite web |last=Lee |first=Nathaniel |title=How the original 'Mary Poppins' transformed the way movies are made today |url=https://www.businessinsider.com/mary-poppins-disney-changed-movies-classic-visual-effects-green-screen-2018-12 |website=[[Business Insider]] |access-date=13 January 2021 |date=26 December 2018}}</ref>

[[Peter Menefee]], one of the 12 dancing chimney sweeps supporting Bert, provided some insight into the film's choreography:

{{Blockquote |text=The choreography wasn't really done until we got there and they mounted it on us. On the first day of filming, the first thing we shot is the very last thing you see – where we're all dancing down the street at the end. That was hard because, although we had worked for almost a month and a half with the brooms and everything, we'd been working on a plywood floor. And all of a sudden, we get out and we're on a cobblestone street and there's supposed to be four of us tumbling right next to each other, and you put the broom down. Even if it had a rubber point, you'd be all over the place. That was really hard.<ref>{{cite web |last=S. |first=Jeana |url=https://www.surfandsunshine.com/pete-menefee-mary-poppins/ |title=An interview with Pete Menefee, Mary Poppins chimney sweep |website=Surf and Sunshine |date=December 5, 2013}}</ref>|source= }}

The film's choreographers were [[Dee Dee Wood]] and her husband [[Marc Breaux]].<ref>{{Cite web |title= Dee Dee Wood |url= https://www.azmusichalloffame.org/inductees/dee-dee-wood-2/ |access-date=2023-03-04 |publisher=Arizona Music & Entertainment Hall of Fame}}</ref> Walt Disney attended the rehearsals for the rooftop scenes every day.<ref>{{cite AV media |last=Frank |first=Rusty |author-link=Rusty Frank |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cK4RsR_5Sjg |title=Pete Menefee – A Dancer's Life |date=January 24, 2021 |via=YouTube}}</ref>