A lot, it turns out! This corporate video from the "virtual backlot" magicians at Stargate Studios, reveals just how much of what we assume are TV location shoots are actually filmed in front of green screens. Why bother shooting Ugly Betty sidestepping a reporter and bumping into someone on the street when you can build a to-scale replica covered in green material, then digitally add an extra being jostled by a phantom Ugly Betty in post? Voila! The illusion is seamless! Watching this, I was reminded of an old sketch from Late Night with David Letterman in which Mark Hamill cracks an egg into a bowl; then a video spoofing those Star Wars making-of featurettes reveals that the egg was rigged with several tiny explosive charges, and Hamill had actually just mimed cracking it in front of a blue screen. Get it? It would have been easier just to shoot him cracking an egg! (But not as cool.) (And if anyone can find that video, I'd be much obliged.) Anyway, here's the video. Et tu, Hiro Nakamura? Et tu? [via Paul Scheer]