Watch Guillermo Del Toro Create Movie Magic With The Shape of Water

Even if Guillermo del Toro walks away empty-handed on Oscar night (spoiler alert: he won’t), he’s already a winner. When the 2018 Academy Award nominations were announced on Tuesday morning, del Toro’s The Shape of Water managed to nab 13 of them—the most of any movie released last year—including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Supporting Actor.

Yet even with so much talent both in front of and behind the camera, it would have been impossible for del Toro and his cast to tell this merman romance so convincingly if it weren’t for the magic of visual effects.

To see just how much of a difference VFX made to the film, Mr. X—the award-winning visual effects company that has collaborated with del Toro on several films, including Pacific Rim and Crimson Peak—posted a video, spotted by Laughing Squid, that shows the before and after of many of the movie’s key visual effects.

You can check out the video below (just make sure you wait to watch it until after you’ve seen the movie, as it contains a number of spoilers).