Question for Starwars fans (modeling related)

[Steve N]

Take the "Dogfights" series on the History Channel for instance. Although the scenes are clearly CGI, they have all been directed well and dramatically help to illustrate the story and convey the urgency of the combat.

I like "Dogfights," but I think in an attempt to give the CGI a documentary look, they overdo some of the fast zooms and rack focuses, and they definitely waaayyy overuse the "wake-from-a-near-miss-makes-the-camera-shake" effect.

SN

[GreyGhost]

Yeah, the 'Wake Effect" has sort of become the new "Flashlight beams make a 'Whoosh' sound" ...

Gregg

[mgrandison]

OK. True on some of the 'effects' they use, but overall it's a good series. I can't imagine how gruesome the bf-109 ramming into an actual bomber in mid-air moments must have looked/felt like in real life. Damn.

PS. God bless all of our Veterans.

[datahiker]

My 2 pennies:

CGI and fancy special effects can't improve poor writing, acting or directing. The effects added to the Special Editions and inherent in the prequels clutter the screen in most cases (In best monster truck rally voice: NOW FEATURING EVEN MORE MORE MORE ALIENS AND SIGHT GAGS!!!)

CGI has its place. But using effects as the main focus in a movie instead of plot just doesn't do it for me.

[chukw]

I storyboarded this- and we're quite proud of it here at blur studio:

The Force Unleashed II Trailer

CG is a tool, and in the right hands- and with a decent budget- can be a wonderful thing indeed.

Cheers!

chuk

[GreyGhost]

Chuk, I love the first TFU and I'm looking forward to TFU II very much ... :P

Very nice work on the Trailer, I hope the game lives up to it ...

Gregg

[RiderFan]

CGI has everything to do with the way objects move, that's why their called CGI animators but I do agree with the rest of your point.

Not really. I've been in the industry for 20 years. CG is a tool for animation. The technology of CG has nothing to do with the person using it. If you didn't like the way something moved, talk to the animator. They make the same mistakes as someone holding a physical model on a stick in front of a camera. CG has nothing to do with the way objects move. This reminds me of those conversations with people that say Windows was responsible for their hard drive physically breaking.

[GreyGhost]

Gregg

[RiderFan]

Huh? You're contradicting yourself. From the Oxford Dictionary:

Animate (an·i·mate) verb : Pronunciation:/ˈanəˌmāt/ [with object]

2 (usually be animated) give (a movie or character) the appearance of movement using animation techniques

Link to full definition with homonyms.

Good lord man, I'm in the industry. I do this for a living. Can you say that? If you were to sit down in front of a 3D modelling or animation package would you have any idea where to even start? I'm going to guess no. So how can you have any idea what the tool is capable of?

I didn't contradict myself at all. CGI is a tool. Like a screwdriver. The animator is the person using the tool. If the person uses the screw driver to hammer a nail, is that the screwdriver's fault? No.. it's the person trying to smash a nail into the wall with it.

CGI is a set of tools and has nothing to do with the abilities of the person using it. You CAN divorce the two. If someone can't create a realistic motion path in their 3D tool of choice, it's not the tools fault.

So I'll say again. CGI is the tool for animation. It has nothing to do with how the animators use it.

And now I'm done.

Edited July 17, 2010 by RiderFan

[Pirata]

Good lord man, I'm in the industry. I do this for a living. Can you say that? If you were to sit down in front of a 3D modelling or animation package would you have any idea where to even start? I'm going to guess no. So how can you have any idea what the tool is capable of?

I work in the movie industry and believe me, the studio and the viewing public don't care what the tool is capable of or how it works. They care how the tool is used by the animators. That has been my point all along. I know because I get to hear their complaints.

If someone can't create a realistic motion path in their 3D tool of choice, it's not the tools fault.

I say again:

Furthermore, my comments were always geared toward the animators.

And I repeat:

CGI does more stuff right than wrong.

It doesn't sound like I'm blaming the tool to me. Where do you get that idea?

If the person uses the screw driver to hammer a nail, is that the screwdriver's fault?

That's silly. I never said that, but I did say:

Allow me to repeat, by quoting myself from post #19: "I never said I was anti-CGI."

I'm not blaming CGI, or a screwdriver, for anything. Like everybody else here, I merely expressed a concern about how CGI is used in aviation sequences in movies. I could care less how they're done in video games. I challenge you to find one comment I made that condemns CGI. You won't.

Now, we're done.

@GreyGhost:

[niart17]

Sure, why not I'll add my two cents here. I think in general, CGI aviationis better than traditional model building because of the ability to put it in any orientation without the need to worry about supports or camera angles. True, MOST CGI airplane scenes have not really come close to looking totally realistic compared to REAL planes, but I can't think of any movies that used MODEL planes in flight that look as good as CGI. If anyone can show me an example of a model plane looking better in flight than a CGI I'd love to see it.

Now having said that, space flight scenes are a totally different realm. In my opinion, slow moving scenes of large ships I.E. Star Destroyers, the Enterprise etc... that don't require fast paced camera work have been better done with traditional models since the surface detail is usually more believable and most movement is simple camera sweeps across the model. I don't however think that the fast x-wing battle scenes are any better with models than with CGI. I think combining the two in the re-makes was a mistake though as they are obviously different. IMHO they should have either used traditional models to add any new scenes they felt the need to, redone them all with CGI to make them cohesive OR left it alone (which has my vote).

There are exceptions to my thoughts about large ship models being better though. I feel the ships in District 9 and Battle Star could rival most any traditional model.

That's my 2cent

Bill

[DutyCat]

CGI has its place. But using effects as the main focus in a movie instead of plot just doesn't do it for me.

Well, now that is an entirely different subject, isn't it? I agree, BTW.

[Av8fan]

This is sort of CG related

Lucas lost me with Jar Jar Binks.

C3P0 and R2D2 were funny.

Lucas must have been smoking is own press reports if he thought Binks was funny. Yes I know, Kids thought he was.

Sorry.

My 0.2 cents

[GreyGhost]

<....>

@GreyGhost:

My point was that things were getting a bit heated ...

Lets not add movie special effects to the list of taboo subjects . M'kay ?

Gregg

[Pirata]

My point was that things were getting a bit heated ...

Lets not add movie special effects to the list of taboo subjects . M'kay ?

Agreed, but I was getting needlessly, repeatedly, attacked for something I clearly did not say and that message was not getting through. I hope you can appreciate my frustration. Perhaps my suspicious nature got the best of me. My apologies to you and everybody else who is viewing the thread.

Edited July 17, 2010 by Pirata

[George Creed]

"Avitar" by James Cameron.

Even the actors where CGI.

:)

[GreyGhost]

Agreed, but I was getting needlessly, repeatedly, attacked for something I clearly did not say and that message was not getting through. I hope you can appreciate my frustration. Perhaps my suspicious nature got the best of me. My apologies to you and everybody else who is viewing the thread.

My " " post was more of a generality and not directed at any one member ...

Think of it as a "Let's not let this spiral out of control ..." No need to apologize to me anyway ...

Gregg

[Steve N]

"This is supposed to be a happy occasion! Let's not argue and bicker about who killed who....."

"Avatar" by James Cameron. Even the actors where CGI.

Maybe it's because I saw it in 2D, but overall Avatar left me rather underwhelmed. That's not to say I didn't enjoy it, but the CGI characters still looked cartoony to me. I don't think it was Cameron's best work..I still think Aliens and Abyss were much better..I enjoy watching them over and over, but really don't have any interest in seeing Avatar again (except maybe in IMAX 3D to see what all the fuss is about.) But again, that comes down to the writing, directing, and performances rather than what tools were used to make the finished product. To me the weakest part of Avatar wasn't the CGI, but a tired, derivative story and cliched characters and dialogue. The film was totally predicatable from the first frame, and the characters uninteresting shallow cliches..the best summation I heard was "a three-dimensional movie with one-dimensional characters."

SN

[madmike]

Stay on target everyone

If I see this thread degenerating into blow by blow rebuttal of everyone's posts, then the fun and interest has gone.

[TaiidanTomcat]

I think the saddest thing about Star Wars CGI is it cheated everyone. not just the audience. think of the actors and stage hands, how excited they must have been to be involved in Star Wars!! Think of the props, the cool sets, the costumes... and then its just a green room. Nothing real to write home about.

The best star wars review is by Red Letter Media, you can find it on Youtube, but you had better have a lot of time. The Episode I review is 70 minutes and the Episode II review is even a little bit longer... But boy are they worth it!

Here is a clip of lucas realizing he has done "too much" in episode I:

^ WARNING: adult language ^

Edited July 18, 2010 by TaiidanTomcat

[Superjew]

^Great review, I guess I should watch the whole thing when I have more time.

COnsidering how big they knew star wars phantom menace was going to be after waiting, I forget 15+ years, They could of easily afforded models rather than CGI. Titanic could of been made entirely of Blue screen, but they used an actual ship made up to look like it. It was so good, I watched the movie twice and there were some people that watched it like a dozen times.

I gotta admit, contray to my OP, CGI has been used succesfully in films like Terminator 2 for the t1000, Jurassic Park and Titanic to make some epic films, I just think Lucas overly relied upon it too much to the point that virtually EVERYTHING and every scene was CGI and even some of the characters were entirely CGI. Alot of the original star wars was done on a blue screen, but not as much as the new ones were. Like that scene where ObiWan is standing over an Abyss in the Deathstar while shutting down its tractor beams was done with the object he was standing on, and the rest was blue screen whereas that scene in the new one where ObiWan is walking through the Clone Facility as seen in the review was ALL blue screen, even the character he was talking too.

One example is the Jabba the Hutt from ROTJ looks a lot better than the CGI Jabba the Hutt added into the 1997 Starwars a New Hope.

Atleast the 3rd new starwars almost salvaged the series as a whole for how big a dissappointment the Phantom Menace was. Sucks that Darth Vadar only had like 2 lines and one of them was "Noooooo!" considering that James Earl Jones is still alive and still sounds the same.

Edited July 18, 2010 by Superjew

[GreyGhost]

Wow, talk about over analyzing ...

Don't really want to watch a movie review that's as long as the movie ...

Gregg

[deadmeat]

Wow, talk about over analyzing ...

Don't really want to watch a movie review that's as long as the movie ...

Gregg

Its worth it. As a bonus it is like a 101 course in film making.

[TaiidanTomcat]

I gotta admit, contray to my OP, CGI has been used succesfully in films like Terminator 2 for the t1000, Jurassic Park and Titanic to make some epic films, I just think Lucas overly relied upon it too much to the point that virtually EVERYTHING and every scene was CGI and even some of the characters were entirely CGI. Alot of the original star wars was done on a blue screen, but not as much as the new ones were. Like that scene where ObiWan is standing over an Abyss in the Deathstar while shutting down its tractor beams was done with the object he was standing on, and the rest was blue screen whereas that scene in the new one where ObiWan is walking through the Clone Facility as seen in the review was ALL blue screen, even the character he was talking too.

One example is the Jabba the Hutt from ROTJ looks a lot better than the CGI Jabba the Hutt added into the 1997 Starwars a New Hope.

Atleast the 3rd new starwars almost salvaged the series as a whole for how big a dissappointment the Phantom Menace was. Sucks that Darth Vadar only had like 2 lines and one of them was "Noooooo!" considering that James Earl Jones is still alive and still sounds the same.

T2, Jurassic park, and Titanic were all from an era where everything was supposed to look real. In effect they used special effects to make things look normal. Nowadays its reversed. CG is used to make the normal look more like special effects. If people can't tell you are using CG, you are doing it wrong now. You have to show off.

I used to laugh at the old black and white saucer movies my dad showed me "dad" I would say "i can see the strings!" he used to tell that everyone could and just ignored them. I can't wait when my kids tell me all the CGI movies I watched "sucked" because "you can clearly see its fake looking" I will explain to them how people spent millions of dollars and thousands of hours on CGI effects so that people could essentially ignore them because they look fake... but how do you ignore an entire movie? those old saucer films realized it wasn't very convincing so they made up for it in other ways. can't do that with Avatar. its Disney (Pocahantus) simple.

Its worth it. As a bonus it is like a 101 course in film making.

I agree I have watched all the reviews he has done. I didn't like the prequels they all let me down, but I never realized how they let me down until he pointed out the failed basics in the story telling of all the latest Star Wars films. Lucas basically took the original formula that worked so well on the original trilogy and just threw it all out the window.

Edited July 20, 2010 by TaiidanTomcat

[deadmeat]

I agree I have watched all the reviews he has done. I didn't like the prequels they all let me down, but I never realized how they let me down until he pointed out the failed basics in the story telling of all the latest Star Wars films. Lucas basically took the original formula that worked so well on the original trilogy and just threw it all out the window.

And on the flip side, he really notes how George absolutely hit a home run with the original Star Wars. The characters, the pacing, the action...he praises them as note perfect and an absolute masterpiece. Episode 4 certainly is that...a sci-fi masterpiece that stands the test of time (bits of clunky dialogue here and there not withstanding). Far from being an out and out Lucas basher, the Plinkett reviews are a celebration of that made Star Wars so great and where it went wrong along the way.