_____________________________________________________________

To see my demo reel, just click here:

http://www.pondoflife.com/perry/reel.html

To See just my gallery of still images just click here:

http://www.pondoflife.com/perry/gallery.html

Thursday, July 26, 2007

CG for CG's sake = lame



OK, I haven't seen Beowulf yet (no one has, it isn't even finished) but the trailer that appeared for
it made me start to think about something that people who know me would probably be surprised to hear me say (or write, in this case). I am disturbed by the notion of doing a realistic CG movie just to say you did. I am not AT ALL suggesting that is what Robert Zemeckis has done with Beowulf, but since we have yet to see so little of the movie, the fact that nothing in the trailer REQUIRED the characters to be created in CG, makes me wonder what happens in the story that DID dictate that the movie should be done all CG? I am confident that there is quite a lot there that dictated that choice. But it does suggest a potential trend that I see: things that
could more easily and convincingly done with live performers are starting to be done with CG characters instead. Why? Just because we can, does that mean we should? I would say no. The story, to which everything should be in service of, should dictate more than anything what medium the film is created with. But does it always? Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within was just a dull and story-poor movie. It could have been done for a lot less money and effort with real humans playing the real humans (I can't even believe I have to write that!), but it was done with CG "humans" because it had never been done before. If the first fully computer generated film was done in CG because it could, we really wouldn't be in the same place we are now, with CG films making gobs of money at the boxoffice.

Thankfully, we got Toy Story as the first fully CG film, a film that really was tailor made to be done in CG, since it was all about the "secret life of toys" and created a fantastic and not-too-real world that they lived in. The story was great, the acting was great, and it really was the BEST way to tell THAT story. I leave it up to seeing the movie in November when it is released to judge for myself whether Beowulf was best created in CG or not. What do you think about this possible new trend?

1 comment:

cubedude89 said...

Toy Story was amazing! Final Fantasy was not so much.

That trailer looked amazing, But I agree. why use digital actors...based on real actors... when you can just use the real actor...
Doesn't make much sense.
It looks pretty cool though. I hope its good.