How much CGI is too much CGI? Let’s take a look at
ten issues I have with modern CGI.
It seems like “good” CGI, or at least audiences
perceptions of good CGI, is in decline over the past
few years. Sure, you have amazing anomalies like
Gravity or Interstellar , but on a whole, CGI quality is
trending downward. Is CGI getting worse? Or are
audiences harder to please? Let’s take a closer look
at the state of VFX industry in the following post.
1. CGI has transitioned from a complimentary
dish to the main course.
CGI had major limitations when first introduced.
Because of this, is was used as a last resort. Even
Steven Spielberg had this mindset until he introduced
Shia Leboeuf going full-on Tarzan with CGI monkeys
in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal
Skull. The CG Supervisor for that movie had this to
say : “Viewers will hardly notice the 45 minutes of
CGI in the film.” Really?
Jurassic Park is a great example of complimentary
CGI. They couldn’t design the animatronics to walk
around for the wide shots, so they used CGI to solve
this problem. What you got were wide CGI shots
offset with closeup live action animatronics. The CGI
reinforced the idea that the dinos weren’t just static
robots, and the robots reinforced the idea that they
were really in the scene with the actors.
2. The physics are off.
After the success of movies like Terminator 2 and
Jurassic Park, it became apparent that CGI was the
best way to create realistic effects. One of the main
reasons CGI outshined techniques like stop-motion
was movement. It got the physics right.
Now, over 20 years later, Hollywood has lost the
concept of realistic movement with CGI. Scenes from
movies like Matrix Reloaded or Catwoman showcase
stunts that are impossible to perform with an actual
human . Movies have abandoned the concept of
physics and with it goes the audience’s perceptions
of reality.
Cracked.com took a look at some of the pitfalls of
modern CGI. What made the top of their list? A
complete disregard for gravity, friction and intertia:
There might be a time when CGI finally traverses
the uncanny valley and becomes indistinguishable
from the real world. Only none of that will matter as
long as filmmakers continue to apply physics with
a spongy fist…sometimes having that “sky’s the
limit” freedom means knowing when to keep it
grounded.
Hollywood is trying to rewrite the laws of motion….
Isaac Newton must be rolling over in his grave. “An
object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion
stays in motion with the same speed and in the same
direction…unless the script says otherwise.”
3. CGI has put us in a state of denial.
CGI’s purpose should be to make a stunt or effect
look more real. Whenever we see good CGI, we
shouldn’t realize it’s good CGI. We shouldn’t even
notice it at all. It should be so real and grounded
that it pulls us into the story instead of distracting
us. We’re in a state of denial where we keep telling
ourselves ‘But it’s really good CGI! Look at how good
that CGI is! Wow, I can’t imagine how many hours
were spent rendering that! Every frame is so dense.’
If we have to discuss CGI, then the CGI didn’t do its
job. CGI is getting worse because it’s trying to
impress us rather than fool us.l
4. The move to HD and 4K make CGI less
convincing.
CGI is far from perfect. But when the delivery format
was celluloid and SD, it masked the imperfections of
CGI and made everything look more realistic.
Filmmakers furthered the illusion by purposely
compositing CGI into poorly lit scenes and behind
elements like smoke and rain. Now with the stunning
clarity of 2K and 4K (and even more so with HFR),
we’re starting to see the cracks in the pavement. As
resolution increases, CGI is becoming less
convincing.
5. Stylized grades and CGI don’t mix.
The over-saturated color scheme blooming with
every conceivable tone of orange and teal is ruining
CGI. CGI needs all the help it can get when
composited into a scene. When you splash a hyper-
realistic grade over the top, it makes everything look
fake including the CGI. This is why Dawn of the
Planet of the Apes and Jurassic Park look incredibly
real. They incorporated CGI into scenes that had
realistic lighting and color.
The Cracked post also commented on the perils of
the “Blockbuster” grade :
Movies like Transformers and The Hunger Games
are so aggressively teal and orange that they look
like big-budget adaptations of a Spencer Gifts
blacklight poster. As we’ve explained before , the
reason for this is that those two colors are on
opposite sides of the color wheel, and as such are
immediately pleasing to human eyes. Since human
skin best resembles orange more than anything
else on that wheel, color graders had an easy
starting point to completely ruin every film they
work on.
Case in point? The new Jurassic World looks like a
super hero movie. I half expected Tony Stark to be
training raptors with Chris Pratt . The oversaturated
grade makes it look more like a fantasy where
dinosaurs only exist on a computer screen.
6. There’s no restraint.
Christopher Nolan shows incredible restraint with
CGI. If it’s too expensive or just not feasible to
capture in camera, he’ll rely on CGI to recreate the
effect realistically. Hollywood doesn’t know how to
show restraint with CGI. Their mentality is ‘Because
we can, we will’. They want it faster, bigger, brighter,
more colorful, and 10X as epic as the last time.
However sophisticated your computer-generated
imagery is, if it’s been created from no physical
elements and you haven’t shot anything, it’s going
to feel like animation. -Christopher Nolan
7. CGI-driven action is sequel-oriented.
The CGI in every sequel has a major goal: it has to
be more impressive, complex, and crazier than its
predecessor. The stakes have to be higher.
Filmmakers try to create engagement with more
explosions rather than letting story, plot, and
character development produce interest.
Another huge issue is that in a world of endless
sequels, we no longer have to worry about our main
character’s well-being. We don’t need to be invested
in the characters because there’s no chance they’ll
die. They aren’t in any real peril. The actors have
already signed up for two sequels! James Cameron
is working on three Avatar sequels simultaneously!
What’s happening now is that filmmakers are making
scenes more and more extravagant to offset this
sequel fatigue. They keep pushing the limits to keep
us saying ‘well surely they can’t survive this’ until it
gets utterly ridiculous.
8. CGI is dangerous.
CGI is paralyzing the film industry. It’s taking over
production time, budgets, story, and even replacing
real characters. It’s making films worse. If we
allocated the amount of resources we spend on CGI
toward hiring better writers, creating cooler set
designs, and minimizing post production, we’d have
better cinema. Because of the damage done by CGI,
Hollywood can only finance CGI-fest films with
bloated budgets. The people demand CGI and the
only way to keep the demand up is to increase the
dose of CGI.
9. CGI encourages lazy filmmaking.
CGI has put filmmakers in the ‘we’ll fix it in post’
mindset. It has made them incredibly lazy. There’s
no dedication to the craft when you can endlessly fix
imperfections on a computer screen. Why go the
extra mile to capture a stunt in-camera when you
can hand it over to ILM to recreate? Take Jurassic
World for instance. They recently released a raptor
training scene. There are so many opportunities to
use animatronics in this scene, but they didn’t. Even
the closeup shots were CGI. Where’s the passion?
Where’s the commitment to realism? It’s a shame,
and it’s so lazy.
10. CGI has made us complacent.
CGI is like a drug. The more we keep exposing
ourselves to it, the less effect it has on us. We’re
chasing the dragon, so to speak. A collapsing
practical indoor set isn’t cool anymore. You know
what’s cool? An entire buildingl collapsing! A chance
encounter with Darth Vader on Cloud City? Lame. We
need a 12 minute duel filled with over the top action
on a volcanic planet costing 70,000 man hours to
create.
What this has lead to is a complacency with
traditional movie drama. It leaves us less impressed
with real life situations and settings. It makes us
yawn at authentic dramatic tension because it
doesn’t contain a sweeping CGI destruction show.

https://www.rocketstock.com/blog/opinion-10-reasons-why-cgi-is-getting-worse-not-better/

First world problems. Outdated article.
The more CGI in a movie, the more enjoyable for me. The only drawback CGI has on a movie for me is the countless takes actors make to compensate interaction with imaginary on-screen objects.
Most big budget movies employing the process painstakingly cross-check details to avoid huge losses at the box-office. The avengers movies're a cgi-fest yet smash box office records. Jurassic park, harry potter, transformers and Lord of the rings to say the least.

Even the second highest selling tv production game of thrones employs heavy use of cgi. HD viewing makes it even better as filming techniques have adjusted to make better use of it.

charix:
First world problems. Outdated article.
The more CGI in a movie, the more enjoyable for me. The only drawback CGI has on a movie for me is the countless takes actors make to compensate interaction with imaginary on-screen objects.
Most big budget movies employing the process painstakingly cross-check details to avoid huge losses at the box-office. The avengers movies're a cgi-fest yet smash box office records. Jurassic park, harry potter, transformers and Lord of the rings to say the least.

Even the second highest selling tv production game of thrones employs heavy use of cgi. HD viewing makes it even better as filming techniques have adjusted to make better use of it.

your trying too hard to sound intelligent.
what's your business with actors countless take. we talking crapy scripts this days with over bloated act ions take, made possible by out of control use of CGI.

notice anything with this movies?

terminator (gyniysis), Thor( dark world), Avengers (age of ultrons)

all big budget release, buy fair considerable low at box office because movie lovers easily could see pass the green back ground( you can take that literarily).
all I saw was effects, more effects, and when I was bored with effects, they gave more CGI effects.
whatever happen to a good story?

follow through here again.
.
CGI is paralyzing the film industry. It’s taking over
production time, budgets, story, and even replacing
real characters. It’s making films worse. If we
allocated the amount of resources we spend on CGI
toward hiring better writers, creating cooler set
designs, and minimizing post production, we’d have
better cinema. Because of the damage done by CGI,
Hollywood can only finance CGI-fest films with
bloated budgets. The people demand CGI and the
only way to keep the demand up is to increase the
dose of CGI.

ekemini606:


your trying too hard to sound intelligent.

Big talk for someone who copied and pasted an original article.

what's your business with actors countless take. we talking crapy scripts this days with over bloated act ions take, made possible by out of control use of CGI.

Increases production time thereby elongating how long it would take me to wait for a new blockbuster.
Its inevitable that scripts would go down the toilet eventually, that's the consequence of big industries; too many stories that after watching 10 movies, the rest all feel the same from the last.
Hollywood reduced the quantity of movies they release yearly to compensate for this handicap. Expect good storied movies from next year and onwards.

notice anything with this movies?
terminator (gyniysis), Thor( dark world), Avengers (age of ultrons)all big budget release, buy fair considerable low at box office because movie lovers easily could see pass the green back ground( you can take that literarily).

Haven't watched terminator however watched the other two, they made big money at the cinemas. I've no clue where you pick statistics from. The CGI use wasn't overdone in any way. Tell me when the organic process is created that allows movie makers translate comic books(fiction in everything) to real life. Ok, I'm sure somewhere in book stores real superheroes can get hired to star in movies.

all I saw was effects, more effects, and when I was bored with effects, they gave more CGI effects.

I'm sure your money was added when rounding up box office figures for those movies.

whatever happen to a good story?

I'm not saying big budget movies with crappy stories don't exist but movie makers are not dummies, they normally focus on other aspects of movies to cover up shortcomings. I've watched really s t u p i d movies that came with extremely good soundtracks or something else remarkable to take your mind from the story. This is a skill nollywood still can't replicate till this day and is a skill that comes with time, experience and attention to detail.

follow through here again.
.
[s]CGI is paralyzing the film industry. It’s taking over[/s]
[s]production time, budgets, story, and even replacing[/s]
[s]real characters. It’s making films worse. If we[/s]
[s]allocated the amount of resources we spend on CGI[/s]
[s]toward hiring better writers, creating cooler set[/s]
[s]designs, and minimizing post production, we’d have[/s]
[s]better cinema. Because of the damage done by CGI,[/s]
[s]Hollywood can only finance CGI-fest films with[/s]
[s]bloated budgets. The people demand CGI and the[/s]
[s]only way to keep the demand up is to increase the[/s]
dose of CGI.

I read and understood it the first time.

ekemini606:


your trying too hard to sound intelligent...

Ok fine, you hate CGI. We get it. But you shouldnt insult people for airing their own opinion. Now please move over lemme rewatch my bootleg copy of Avengers 2...