| | By Nick Farrell in Rome @ Wednesday, February 25, 2009 8:17 AM
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| | A woman who lost her legs due to a childhood illness has been transformed into a mermaid by the special effects wizards at Weta Workshop.
 The FX guys for Lord of the Rings, Weta built a mermaid suit for Auckland woman Nadya Vessey so that she could swim exactly like a mermaid.
She wrote to the studios and asked if they could help her in her dream to swim like a mermaid and was stunned when they agreed to give it a go.
Weta costumier Lee Williams worked on the suit between film projects with seven other staff so that Nadya could be beautiful and sexy.
The suit was made mostly of wetsuit fabric and plastic moulds, and was covered in a digitally printed sock. Mermaid-like scales were painted by hand.
The tail was fully functional, and was made to look realistic. When it was tested in the Kilbirnie pool, which is close to Weta's studios, the boffins were amazed at how lifelike the movements were. Apparently Nadya got a good head of steam up swimming in the suit. X
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