[Budoka]

Hi, im writing an extended essay of that title and I am in need of suggestions asto what I can put in it. I have already talked about the first use of cg in film (who framed roger rabbit included!) and talked about Craig's digital form of matte painting but I need more on the possible directions it could take, weird ideas like "in the future all films will have completely computer generated casts and you'll be able to watch the film as it is projected directly into the back of your eye via a small shiny implant" - stupid ideas included! Cheers!

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It's better to burn out than fade away�

[v1510nAry]

mmm looks at blade runner , matrix , and Dungeons and Dragons ,

Showing how real computer graphics can become and 1day will actually the place of actors , all we will need is voice actors (Toy Story)..

Or they will probaly take the place in serious Movies Stunts or even in minor 1'z

.: | v1510nAry | :.

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- Inspiration never ends .....
- [email protected]
- ICQ# 47507088

[Budoka]

Cheers. We actually had a debate in class, 'possibility of actors being replaced by computer generated characters in film and television.' weird idea really, but it could be cool just to see how people would react to half the East Enders cast suddenly turning digital!

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It's better to burn out than fade away�

[v1510nAry]

wonder if the mouth movements for PEGGI!!! would seem right or even more astonoshing if they could do RIKKI!!



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- Inspiration never ends .....
- [email protected] - Dreams Could Come True
- ICQ# 47507088

[Budoka]

True. You'd probably end up with 24 hour East Enders with the computer cast dominating a channel of their own!

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It's better to burn out than fade away�

[Roy Fielding]

Probably best to steer clear of CGI for Eastenders and use wooden puppets.... this would suit the acting style more, don't ya think?

Roy

[Budoka]

Leave i' au' geeza! No wa' I mean?
- Yeah, get your point!

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It's better to burn out than fade away�

[kerosene]

I recommend you should check
cinefex
(special effects magazine) www.vfxpro.com
f/x website with interesting articles and making of stuff of latest films, comercials and videos www.3drender.com has a good rendering forum where you might find people with professional views.

About virtual actors - I don't believe in it. There probably will be some movies made (and maybe even succesfull ones) when it becomes possible. That will be because of curiosity anyway - not a real threat to actors.

In general anyway there isn't any idea using virtual actors for normal shots. It is and will be too expensive. It will be possible to make complex enough animations and models to achieve realism and liveliness - that I do believe (but it is not close future). But there isn't really a way to reduce inputted data. What I mean is that for really live looking acting you need to animate x number of things and there is no way interface could help enough to make it profitable. Anyway the world is full of beautifull and talented actors and you don't have to fight with the realism then. Also the real world is quite a handy user interface.

In further future if artificial intelligence would develope a lot to be accessible maybe it could be used to control the acting. Then it could make a sense and be fast enough to control the characters. But then the AI would have to be already quite close to a person.

e.g. people in toy story 2. They look nice and move well too. Still they are really far from really realistic persons. Look a human eat and watch tv with neck visible for instance. There are so many small things happening that reaching them is very difficult - realism isn't here yet. Also the price at the moment (though going down) is huge.

In stunts and special ocasions use of artficial actors will probably grow really much. Backgroung characters etc. can be created with reasonable efort. But that is no future anymore. Episode one had huge crowd scenes and stunts made CG. Also perfect storm used a lot of CG stunts. I just hope film makers wouldn't forget that story is better starting point than effects that can be made. (episode one again - the worst script after waterworld - maybe not the story but the actual script)

heikki anttila

--------------------- www.projectkerosene.com

[TheNexx]

And don't forget the biggest resource on the net www.cgchannel.com. Right now, if you'll hurry up thay have some innovations fomr AW I guess
Another site ti check will be www.aw.sg.com Go under Maya direcotory and read news on new technologies.
~~~ My favourit one is T3 - new graphic manip tool like photoshop, but gezillion times better. Basically you will need two tablets - one for left hand another for right. You can manipulate, use different tools, even rotate our canvas (not 90deg only but really smoth as if was a paper) and draw with right hand, or vice versa if you're left handed. Besides that thare are a lot of mpg files that explayin and show new technologyes, like REAL sculpting in 3d(which is possible now in Maya using 4dmouse and pen at the same time on one tablet) and many many more ...

[Budoka]

Thanks for all your comments, they are proving to be VERY useful!

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It's better to burn out than fade away�

[Wiked Ewok]

Personally, I don't believe that live actors will ever be replaced by virtual ones. First off, there's the problem about animating it, as Kerosene said. But even greater is the problem of making them have real life expressions. I doubt that even the best artists/programmers in 20 years would be able to mimic life like behaviors such as happiness, sadness, etc. of showing their expressions. That's why Ford's a good choice for a strong lead, and Keanu is a good choice for the meek in the Matrix. To make even one entity express life like behaviors is hard, to make different entities express their own unique personality(fit for their role) is almost impossible. The costs of doing this significantly outweigh the possible advantages(what are these advantages by the way?).

No, I predict that in the next few years, Digital Art will be used extensively for Scenary and props. Think about making a digital Alice in wonderland, where you could make all the wierd things look real, without basing things upon Real Life(i.e. Lucas shot ROTJ in a forest because he didn't know any other environment left, CGI could make a purple pink forest that is totally believable. Am I making any sense?).

[This message has been edited by Wiked Ewok (edited February 21, 2001).]