For those holding the show to be a live-action one... how much of what we see is actually special effects, and how are they created?

In the story I added 'Going Pony' , the method of recording is holography. The time period is a deliberately undefined sixty to eighty years from the time of the reader of the story. The 'camera' is an arm-band/peytral-style government-issued Holocorder. It uses three (RGB) holofield scanning lenses mounted in a nanoconstructed aluminocarbide casing.

The 'show' follows the transformation of a human into an Equestrian, and is broadcast globally on earth via multiple methods, including holokiosk, home threevee, and of course VR, from recordings on Romballs. For the part of the show where the host is a pony, the device must naturally be worn differently, in this case around the neck.

The conceit is that the series is filmed on location and is completely real and completely unscripted. There is, however, an underlying suggestion that the entire show might be partially, or even completely artificial, to serve political advantage and purpose. It is never revealed to the viewer what the reality is in this novel, but in subsequent novels we discover it was, in fact, entirely real as claimed.