Comments on: Two Movies

By: Jimmy

Jimmy — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 10:59:38 +0000

You know, movies have never been real. The fact that cgi can mimick reality means less than you think because movies have always been reality mimickers.

The real potential of cgi lay in reducing the cost of movie creation so that a wider variety of stories can be told. As it stands not however, cgi adds enormously to the cost of film productions and the high the budget the worse the more banal and retarded the story.

By: Scott Sumner

Scott Sumner — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 02:57:03 +0000

Ryan, Thanks for the info. It took me a while to get back here, but the information you provided was quite interesting. Not knowing much about CGI, I had assumed only some of the special effects were done that way. I am impressed.

By: Dan

Dan — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:55:19 +0000

Bump mapping definitely simulates the texture of the surface… it mimics the real world almost exact… after all real objects also have a “photo wrapped around them” (the reflective spectrum of the object) but in 3 dimensions. Bump mapping adds the 3D data for accurate interactive simulation of textures with light rays.

By: Dan

Dan — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:42:46 +0000

As can be seen in comparison to the real world example above, definitely out of the uncanny valley but still maybe a bit too perfect… even with the addition of the blemished…

By: Dan

Dan — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:39:27 +0000

For some reason the links didn't link in the previous posts. Here is the Urls: Admin 1 Admin 2 Admin 3 Admin 4 Admin 5

By: Douglas Knight

Douglas Knight — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 06:17:02 +0000

3/7 has the best CGI of any movie that cost $20k + 1 man-year.

By: mike

mike — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 23:27:51 +0000

What really sells that CGI short are the textures, and lighting. What lay people sometimes miss is that all the little details, the chips and scratches, bumps and bruises, are basically just like a flat photo placed onto the model, but with information that modifies how the light plays off of it.

So the grooves between the bricks, and scratches on the camera are not actually being modeled in 3D. For example, the textures have data that say that this area of the brick should be shadowed as if it were lower then the surrounding area.

You do that, plus change how the light plays off of metal versus carpet or wood, and suddenly you can make a very simple flat surface look marked, weathered or bumpy, and incredibly realistic.

By: Dan

Dan — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 23:02:20 +0000

Very realistic. The architecture featured in the video is quite rare and is known as Modern/Neo Butalism and is known for the white futuristic look but with a strong retro feel. Briefly popular in the late 60's to 70's for big buildings on university campusses, institutes and some public buildings. I was familiar wit a campus filled with these and it surely features windows looking out on inaccessible spaces where debris accumulates etc. Here is some examples: 1 2 2 Yes a real building in the shape of a ship.Similar to the one in the video. Of course what is more striking is what is missing, the absence of movement and life... Of course it is possible as Avatar shows, to animate realistic humanoids at least but still very expensive. Still I won't be surprised to see realistic movement and life added in another 10 years to this video.

By: Simetrical

Simetrical — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 12:28:22 +0000

Vimeo now allows HTML5 for most videos, including for this video, so you can download it.

1) View the video page in a recent version of Safari or Chrome.

2) View the page, and click “Switch to HTML5 player” in the lower right.

3) Begin playing the video.

4) Right-click on video and select “Save Video As…”. This is a built-in browser option, like “Save Image As…” for images.

This will also let the video play if you don’t have Flash installed for some reason, as long as you’re using a supported browser. (Since they use a patent-encumbered codec, Firefox won’t play their videos, as open-source software, although it supports videos in the patent-free Theora format.)

And what you were running into was likely a Flash bug or something anyway, so it probably won’t happen if you use the HTML5 video. You can get full-screen by right-click, “Open Video in New Tab”, F11, then F11 to exit when you’re done — Safari/Chrome don’t have a built-in “full screen” button yet. (Firefox 3.6 does, but it won’t work here, as noted.)

Going to YouTube would also work in this case, but maybe this will help you if it happens to you again. Occasionally it can be useful to be a web developer. (Now if only this blog supported e-mail replies to comments . . .)

By: quanticle

quanticle — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 00:15:17 +0000

That raises the question, of if these folks had not been told that the movie was CGI, how many would have arrived at that conclusion anyway? In addition, does the fact that movie was done using CGI affect people’s assessment of the quality of the movie? In other words, if a person did not know that movie was done with CGI, would they think less of it?