Movie Special Effects

[white avenger]

During my lifetime, special effects have come from this:

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b57PTkA8FkU"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b57PTkA8FkU[/ame]


to this:

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dj1px3WFcFs&feature=channel"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dj1px3WFcFs&feature=channel[/ame]

and, as much as I enjoy seeing real dinosaurs in "Jurassic Park" and all of the alien races and great scenes in movies like the "Star Wars." "Matrix," and "Lord Of The Rings" series as well as many others, I've been wondering about something lately. So, here's the question:

Are computer generated effects slowly pushing live action and live actors out of the movies? Will a time come when a team of men and women sitting at computer keyboards eventually perfect their craft to such an extent that their product will be indestinguishable from actual human performances? And if the answer is yes, do you think that it's actually an advancement to remove the human element entirely from our movies and tv series?

 

[sk]

I'm pretty sure that there will always be a place for real actors in movies.

If you want a human on screen it will always be easier, and cheaper, to just film a real human.

I'm thinking it's the stuntman that should start to worrying the most.
I get the feeling that action sequences are more and more just animated now. No point of risking someones life in an explosion or something like that if you can just draw them in instead.

/SK

 

[Fake Shemp]

I love effects you can touch, that look and are real. As much as CGI can transport us into another world, nothing is real.

But up in the freezing snow in The Thing, those "things" 😀 existed.


My grandad, as barmy as he is, keeps going on about the wonders my sister will grow up and see.. that we wont watch tv on a flat screen, the pictures will be in the middle of the room acting it all out in 3-D for us.

 

[Crashing Doors]

I love all the special effects and don't really think actors will ever become obsolete. Even if CGI gets to the point (and gets cheap enough) that they don't need actors on screen, they'll probably still use actors; either for voice-overs, or for shows/movies that don't require CGI. I mean, just because you can do General Hospital with all CGI "people", I doubt it'll happen.

Even so, I prefer real effects to CGI but unfortunately it's just not possible to do certain things without CGI. Well, you can, but people have certain expectations now. If you did a movie like LOTR with a little kid wearing a Gollum-like costume, nobody would respect it.

 

[Dancing man]

They will always been a place for actors how can a machine perfect real human emotion when it is not human?

Plus people like celebs no one is ever going to have an interview with computer simulated actor number 42.

 

[Hero]

I'm a film major and just finally mastered the use of green screen this semester. I've been working on it for about two. I have no software on my computer, so I have to learn it on Adobe now seeing how I mastered it on Final Cut Pro. Green screen is what's used in the background traditionally to add things not on the set. One of the assignments I accomplished this year was video taping someone surfing on nothing in front of a green screen. Then I had to go back and add oceans/waves in the background, and then a surfboard under his feet.

In terms of effects like adding thousands of people, or as in Buffy, vampires IE: Chosen, I think it's a useful tool. I don't think the battle scene in Chosen could have been done as well as it was on real sets. Also, in the Harry Potter's I know Quidditch would be especially difficult without the use of CGI. However, some people are pushing the limit of this tool. I bought the movie "Pulse 2" because I'm an avid horror movie fan. The whole film was literally filmed on green screen. The only two real things in the film were the two main characters (a father and daughter) and a table they sat at in one scene. I feel like that is just a waste of talent, resources, and makes things more costly. The final battle scene in Chosen and Quidditch are such...epic things I guess you could say, that they deserve to be shown on such a grand scale that could only be accomplished through the use of special effects. Someone driving through a town as seen in Pulse 2 is pretty...useless.

I'm actually not sure what my point of posting was... Probably something along the lines of special effects are useful when needed, but unfair and pointless unless used otherwise.