Examples of Visual effects:

Favorite visual effects:

                                                                             

WEEK 1

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The bridge between the art and science that gave birth to movies is relevant to our understanding of how digital imaging tools function in cinema today. The rendering of fluid dynamics has come a long way . Lack of froth, spray, and bobbles the giant tidal wave At the End Of The Abyss is unconvincing , .Collaboration with Stanford university in short time helped the rendering of water far more realistic.

Stephen Prince utilizes what he called in his article “perceptual realism”  to describe the perfect combination of art and science which is how we define special effects. The Virginia Tech professor and author of multiple books believes that visual effects do not take away from the story of the film. But he also mentions that sometimes moviemakers cheat reality for dramatic purposes. Some films contains false and imaginary elements which are created using visual effects; critics often speak against

those types of films because they believe that the audience can not build a connection with something they have or will never see. This is because the goal in a film is to convince the audience that the VFX shots that they see are truthful to reality. The author also explores the topic of digital visual effects improving the authenticity of a film such as“Zodiac” which took place in 1968 San Francisco. However, the film was being filmed in 2007 and San Francisco would have looked different. Prince believes that due to the wide toolbox filmmakers have nowadays, they are able to replicate an older period of time through the advanced means of digital visual effects.

 

what is the main diffrenses between invisible and spectacular visual effects :

 

Invisible VFX:

 is a form of visual effects used in movies and television that are often not noticed by viewers.

Its use to create objects .moods or even entire locations that otherwise wound be expensive or difficult to do .Invisible VFX add realism to a shot without looking out of place, they blend nicely with the background and mostly offer no distractions.

Spectacular visual effects:

1.Impressive  , breathtaking explosions illusions or visual elements in a movie created with CGI. Its used to add visual interest, realism, or fantasy to a film. Making impossible stunts possible. These are the visual effects which in most cases catch your attention, they are the explosions, the giant animals, interplanetary bodies colliding or scenes with extra ordinary events happening.

 

Beyond Spectacle

In the article, Prince talks about  development of digital visual effects in cinema. He  analyses the underestimated importance of digital visual effects in modern film. Prince challenges the conventional view that visual effects are mainly associated with fantasy and has a minor importance and are misunderstood in the filmmaking, he argues and thinks that digital visual effects has a big impact to the storyline and that they are a key to the future films .Prince explains the differences between the special effects and visual effects and how the terminology change thru the years .Prince as well covers some topics about importance of the impact on lighting and colours as well as a actors performances. wider range of techniques and the impact of digital tools in filmmaking

principles of the illusion and visual effects is:

• assumption
• presumption
• context in reality

Auguste and Louis Lumière were the two greatest pioneers in cinema. They are considered the earliest filmmakers in history as they developed the “cinèmatographe” with which they made the first motion picture. The brothers also made significant advances in photography, art, and medicine.

A Zoetrope:

 is one of several pre-film animation devices that produce the illusion of motion by displaying a sequence of drawings or photographs showing progressive phases of that motion. It was basically a cylindrical variation of the phénakisticope, suggested almost immediately after the stroboscopic discs were introduced in 1833. The definitive version, with easily replaceable picture strips, was introduced as a toy by Milton Bradley in 1866 and became very successful.

How zoetrope works?

What is a zoetrope and how does it work? A zoetrope is a cylinder with vertical slits down the sides. The inside of the cylinder displays a band with a set of sequenced images. When the cylinder spins, the user can see the pictures inside as they look through the slits, which prevent the images from blurring.

Eadweard Muybridge is best known for his photographic studies of motion of humans and animals, although he was also a pioneer in landscape photography. Muybridge worked for the landscape photographer Carleton E.

George Meiles referred to be as a father of visual effects

Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès 8 December 1861 – 21 January 1938) was a French illusionist, actor, and film director. He led many technical and narrative developments in the earliest days of cinema.

Méliès was well known for the use of special effects, popularizing such techniques as substitution splices, multiple exposures, time-lapse photography, dissolves, and hand-painted colour. He was also one of the first filmmakers to use storyboards.His films include A Trip to the Moon (1902) and The Impossible Voyage (1904), both involving strange, surreal journeys somewhat in the style of Jules Verne, and are considered among the most important early science fiction films, though their approach is closer to fantasy.

 The Moon is even the symbol of the Visual Effects Society .The Melies Award, given to individuals who have ‘pioneered a significant and lasting contribution to the art and/or science of the visual effects industry by a way of artistry, invention and groundbreaking work.

George Milies was one of the first one to think that movies can capture dreams.

5 intresting facts about George Milies:

1. GEORGES MÉLIÈS WAS AN ILLUSIONIST BEFORE HE WAS A FILMMAKER.

Méliès’s background in magic undoubtedly aided him in becoming the first master of special effects in cinema.

2. HE PIONEERED SOME OF TODAY’S MOST COMMON FILM TECHNIQUES.

According to Méliès’s official website, the director is responsible for three still widely-used techniques: the first double exposure (which he used in 1898’s The Cave of Demons), the first split screen with performers acting opposite themselves (in 1898’s Four Heads are Better Than One), and the first dissolve (in Cinderella in 1899). He first discovered that cameras could manipulate images in the fall of 1896, when he developed the footage he took after his camera jammed filming a basic street scene.

As one of the earliest film pioneers, Méliès had a hand in all facets of developing the film industry in Europe. According to World Film Directors: Volume I, 1890–1945, in 1896, Méliès ordered the construction of Studio A in the vegetable garden of his property outside of Paris. The building was made entirely of glass walls, with a shed used as a dressing room. However, according to his official website, Méliès was forced to turn his studio into a variety theater in 1915 (which was then turned into a hospital for wounded soldiers during the war)

4. MÉLIÈS TEAMED UP WITH YOUNGER BROTHER GASTON TO BRING HIS MOVIES TO THE UNITED STATES.

As piracy of his films increased overseas, Méliès needed to protect his work. As noted in Georges Méliès, by Elizabeth Ezra, Georges sent Gaston to set up shop in the U.S. to guard his copyrights and distribute his films to the American market.

5. MÉLIÈS DIRECTED THE EARLIEST ADAPTATION OF CINDERELLA.

Although the most famous adaptation of the fairytale is Disney’s 1950 animated version, Méliès first brought it to the big screen as a short in 1899. The film starred Jeanne d’Alcy (as the Fairy Godmother), Méliès’ second wife, who appeared in most of his works.

 

 The cinema of Attractions 

In this article Tom Gunning discusses about the early film and the concept of “Cinema of Attractions”. He explains that in the early days of film ,filmmakers were mainly concern not on narrative and storytelling  but to directly attract attention, inciting visual curiosity, and supplying pleasure through an exciting spectacle. Georges Méliès appeared as an important character in this historical environment, creating films filled with attractive and magical illusions , Méliès himself said that “fable or “tale” it’s only consider in the end ,the scenario in this manner had no importance. Film in the early years itself use to be an attraction ,and it was concentrated to entertain , and establish the contact with the audience. He elaborates Exhibitionism which plays an important role in the early film. Nudity, performers gesturing to the audience with an inviting look or wink ,techniques such as actors looking directly at the camera, breaking the fourth wall, and involving the audience in the visual experience. Cinema of attraction left a long lasting legacy and in todays cinema may not be the dominant form of filmmaking, its elements can still be found in various genres and musicals.

Raymond Frederick Harryhausen (June 29, 1920 – May 7, 2013) was an American-British animator and special effects creator who created a form of stop motion model animation known as “Dynamation”

Raymond Frederick Harryhausen best movies ?

According to a list of Ray Harryhausen movies, the top 5 movies are:

1. Jason and the Argonauts (1963)

2. Clash of the Titans (1981)

3. Mighty Joe Young (1949)

4. The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973)

5. The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958) Harryhausen himself considered Jason and the Argonauts to be his best film

what is a Dynamation?

Dynamation is a technique pioneered by animator Ray Harryhausen. The process involves a sandwiched composite of rear-projected footage, varying horizon lines, and matte glass layers. Dynamation splits the background and foreground of pre-shot live action footage into two separate images into which Harryhausen would animate a model or models, seemingly integrating the live-action with the models. The system consists of split screen, rear projection, and multiple passes with a camera to create the illusion that live action and stop motion footage existed in the same frame.

 

 

What is Digital cinema?

In this article Lev Manovic discusses how cinema changed in recent years .Computer generated movies gained its popularity and many recent blockbusters have been driven by special effects. Hollywood studios used to be the only ones who had enough resources to pay for digital tools. However ,the shift to digital media changed not just Hollywood but filmmaking as a whole. Traditional film technology is being replaced by digital technology and it’s available to film productions as individual filmmakers.

Principles of digital filmmaking change so much that rather than filming a movie the traditional way it’s now possible to generate film directly to a computer. Live action footage no longer is a final point of the film,  now is used as a material for further animation and morphing.

 

 

 

 Movies that was remade:

IT: 1990-2017

Haunted mansion: 2003-2023

 

 

Edwin Catmull

Edwin Earl Catmull (born March 31, 1945) is an American computer scientist who is the co-founder of Pixar and was the President of Walt Disney Animation Studios .He has been honoured for his contributions to 3D computer graphics, including the 2019 ACM Turing Award.

 

John Lasseter

John Alan Lasseter born January 12, 1957)is an American filmmaker, animator, and voice actor. He is the head of animation at Skydance Animation. He was also previously the chief creative officer of Pixar Animation Studios, Walt Disney Animation Studios, and Disneytoon Studios, as well as the Principal Creative Advisor for Walt Disney Imagineering.

 

 

Loren Carpenter 

(born February 7, 1947) is a computer graphics researcher and developer.

He was a co-founder and chief scientist of Pixar Animation Studios. He is the inventor of the Reyes rendering algorithm and is one of the authors of the Photo Realistic Render Man software which implements Reyes and renders all of Pixar’s movies. Following Disney’s acquisition of Pixar, Carpenter became a senior research scientist at Disney Research. He retired in early 2014.^[

 

 

Alvy Ray Smith

(born September 8, 1943) is an American computer scientist who co-founded Lucasfilm’s Computer Division and Pixar, participating in the 1980s and 1990s expansion of computer animation into feature film.

 

George Lucas discovers computer graphics: 

The article explores the influence of George Lucas in the early adoption and development of computer graphics in the filmmaking industry. It highlights Lucas’s journey and contributions, as well as the collaborative efforts and innovative techniques that paved the way for the integration of computer-generated imagery (CGI) in films. The article also emphasizes the role played by Alvy Ray Smith in pushing the boundaries of technology and creativity. It traces the timeline of Lucas’s engagement with computer graphics, showcasing the projects and individuals that shaped this cinematic revolution. The article underscores the symbiotic relationship between the entertainment industry and technological innovation, providing valuable insights into the historical development of computer graphics in filmmaking. It is relevant to researchers, film enthusiasts, and technology historians interested in the intersections of film, technology, and computer graphics.

 

Uncanny valley meaning:

The uncanny valley is a term used to describe the relationship between the human-like appearance of a robotic object and the emotional response it evokes. In this phenomenon, people feel a sense of unease or even revulsion in response to humanoid robots that are highly realistic.

uncanny valley graph:

        ‘The Uncanny Valley’

In this article  Mori talks about the concept of “The Uncanny Valley. ”It happens when robots are very similar to humans ,but  do not look realistic enough. He was explaining how industrial robots were mainly designed based on functionality ,and didn’t look anything like humans so people didn’t feel affinity towards them .In contrast, a toy robot’s designer may focus more on the robot’s appearance than its functions. Consequently, despite its being a sturdy mechanical figure, the robot will start to have a roughly human-looking external form with a face, two arms, and two legs because kids seem to feel a deeper attachment  to these toy robots. Mori gives an example of a prosthetic hand and says even how similar it might look ,once we realize that the hand that looked real at first sight is actually artificial, we experience an eerie sensation.

Mori hopes that in the future designs, build robots and prosthetic hands  will not fall into the uncanny valley. Mori recommends that designers instead take the first peak as their goal, which results in a moderate degree of human likeness and a considerable sense of affinity. In fact, I predict that it is possible to create a safe level of affinity by deliberately pursuing a nonhuman design.

 

Walter Elias Disney (December 5, 1901 –  December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer, and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film producer, he holds the record for most Academy Awards earned and nominations by an individual.

Classic Disney movies cartoons: Beauty and the Beast (1991), The Lion King (1994), Aladdin (1992), Cinderella (1950), The Jungle Book (1967), The Little Mermaid (1989), Tarzan (1999), Robin Hood (1973), Alice in Wonderland (1951), Peter Pan (1953)

 

Sleeping beauty:

Filled with jealousy, the evil witch Maleficent curses Princess Aurora to die on her 16th birthday. Thanks to Aurora’s guardian fairies  she only falls into a deep sleep that can be ended with a kiss from her betrothed, Prince Phillip.

Squash and Stretch: This principle gives a sense of weight and flexibility to objects and characters. In “Sleeping Beauty,” it can be seen in the movements of characters.

Secondary Action: This adds to and enriches the main action. A secondary action might be a character’s hair moving as they walk.

Appeal: The characters in “Sleeping Beauty,” from the princess to the villain, are all designed with strong, memorable appeal.

Slow In and Slow Out: The speed of an action starts slowly, speeds up, and then slows down again. This principle adds a more natural rhythm to movements.

12 Principles of Animation:

1. Squash and Stretch.

Squash and stretch is applied to give a sense of weight and/or flexibility to objects or even to people. Animate a simple object like a bouncing ball – as it hits the ground, you can squash the ball flat and widen it.

Although exaggerated, this animation is grounded in reality, because it creates the illusion of the ball being distorted by an outside force – just like in real life.

 

2. Anticipation.

Use anticipation to add some realism when you want to prepare your audience for some action. Consider what people do when they prepare to do something. A footballer about to take a penalty would steady themselves with their arms or swing their foot back ready to kick.

3. Staging.

When considering staging, you’re in the role of a film or theatre director. You need to think about where you’re putting the camera, what it’s focusing on, where the ‘actors’ will be and what they’re going to do. Whether they’re fun cartoon characters or realistically drawn people, staging matters and is sometimes underestimated.

You want your audience’s attention to be on the important elements of the story you’re telling and avoid distracting them with unnecessary detail. With a combination of lighting, framing and composition, plus ensuring that you remove clutter, you’ll be able to effectively advance your story.

4. Straight Ahead Action and Pose to Pose.

Straight Ahead and Pose to Pose are in a sense two principles in one, each concerning different approaches to drawing. Straight ahead action scenes involve animating each frame from beginning to end. Do this to create a fluid illusion of movement for action scenes, but not if you want to create exact poses with proportions maintained.

With pose to pose, animators start by drawing key frames and they fill in the intervals later. Because relation to surroundings and composition become more important, this approach is preferable for emotional, dramatic scenes. As Disney films often involve dramatic and action scenes, their animators would often adopt both approaches.

5. Follow Through and Overlapping Action.

These two movement-based principles combine to make movement in animation more realistic and create the impression characters are following the laws of physics.

Follow through concerns the parts of the body that continue to move when a character stops. The parts then pull back towards the centre of mass, just like with a real person. Follow through also applies to objects.

6. Ease In, Ease Out.

This animation principle is also known as ‘slow in and slow out’. In the real world, objects have to accelerate as they start moving and slow down before stopping. For example, a person running, a car on the road or a pendulum.To represent this in animation, more frames must be drawn at the beginning and end in an action sequence. Ease in, ease out adds more realism to your animation and will help the audience identify and sympathise with your characters.

7. Arcs.

In real life, most actions have an arched trajectory. To achieve greater realism, animators should follow this principle. Whether you’re creating the effect of limbs moving or an object thrown into the air, movements that follow natural arcs will create fluidity and avoid unnatural, erratic animation.

To keep arcs in mind, traditional animators often draw them lightly on paper to use as reference and to erase when they’re no longer needed. Speed and timing are important with arcs, as sometimes they happen so quickly that they blur to the point they’re unrecognisable.

8. Secondary Action.

This principle of animation helps emphasise the main action within a scene by adding an extra dimension to your characters and objects. Subtleties, such as the way a person swings their arms while walking down the street, give colour to your creations and make them appear more human.

Providing they don’t take attention away from the main action, secondary actions can really bring a scene to life.

9. Timing.

As in real life, animation is all about timing. Get this principle right and it grounds your animation in realism, as everything will appear to follow the laws of physics. Think about the size and weight of your characters in relation to what and who are around them. A lightweight person or object is going to react quicker to being pushed than a heavy one.

To get your timing right in animation, get your number of frames or drawings right. As with the ease in, ease out animation principle, the slower the action, the more frames or drawings you’ll need to add.

10. Exaggeration.

This is a fine art and one that Disney animators are experts at. Many of the 12 principles of animation are grounded in realism and this is no exception. However, if you totally avoid exaggeration, animation can often be too real and is in danger of looking dull.

Disney believes that exaggeration should be true to reality to an extent, but made more extreme – often pushed just beyond the realms of realism, to make their characters pop and add fun to their adventures.

A classic trope and great example of exaggeration in animation is the jaw drop. When a character is surprised, shocked or falls in love at first sight, animators often don’t just show a slightly stunned, open-mouthed expression. They get their point across by showing their character’s mouth dropping way beyond realism – often literally to the floor.

11. Solid Drawing.

Solid drawing in animation is one of the more difficult principles to get right, especially in traditional animation. This is because you need to make your creations feel 3D and give them weight and volume. Art classes are useful to give you deeper knowledge of weight, balance, gravity, light, shadow and more. In The Illusion of Life, Johnston and Thomas warned of the danger of creating ‘twins’, where characters would appear lifeless because their left and right sides were exactly the same.

12. Appeal.

The last of the 12 principles of animation is one of the most important. In film, TV and theatre, directors want their actors to have charisma. It doesn’t matter whether they’re a hero or villain – the characters should be interesting enough to make viewers want to know how their story develops.

 

 

Matte painting:

is a technique in which a painting, photograph, or digital image is used to augment or replace elements in a shot. This method has been used since the early 1900s and has become an integral part of creating impressive visuals.

The process typically involves taking photographs or pre-existing artwork, digitally editing them, and then combining them with other elements such as 3D models, special effects, and props. These painting can be used for wide shots of landscapes and cities, close-ups of interiors or objects, abstract art, animation backgrounds, sky replacements, and more.

In addition to being cost-effective and time-efficient, this technique offers filmmakers the flexibility to create unique visuals that would otherwise be impossible without it.

 

Physical compositing

In physical compositing the separate parts of the image are placed together in the photographic frame and recorded in a single exposure. The components are aligned so that they give the appearance of a single image. The most common physical compositing elements are partial models and glass paintings.

Partial models are typically used as set extensions such as ceilings or the upper stories of buildings. The model, built to match the actual set but on a much smaller scale, is hung in front of the camera, aligned so that it appears to be part of the set. Models are often quite large because they must be placed far enough from the camera so that both they and the set far beyond them are in sharp focus.

Glass shots are made by positioning a large pane of glass so that it fills the camera frame, and is far enough away to be held in focus along with the background visible through it. The entire scene is painted on the glass, except for the area revealing the background where action is to take place. This area is left clear. Photographed through the glass, the live action is composited with the painted area. A classic example of a glass shot is the approach to Ashley Wilkes’ plantation in Gone with the Wind. The plantation and fields are all painted, while the road and the moving figures on it are photographed through the glass area left clear.

A variant uses the opposite technique: most of the area is clear, except for individual elements (photo cutouts or paintings) affixed to the glass. For example, a ranch house could be added to an empty valley by placing an appropriately scaled and positioned picture of it between the valley and the camera.

digital compositing:

In television studios, blue or green screens may back news-readers to allow the compositing of stories behind them, before being switched to full-screen display. In other cases, presenters may be completely within compositing backgrounds that are replaced with entire “virtual sets” executed in computer graphics programs. In sophisticated installations, subjects, cameras, or both can move about freely while the computer-generated imagery (CGI) environment changes in real time to maintain correct relationships between the camera angles, subjects, and virtual “backgrounds”.

Virtual sets are also used in motion picture filmmaking, usually photographed in blue or green screen environments (other colours are possible but less common), as for example in Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. More commonly, composited backgrounds are combined with sets – both full-size and models – and vehicles, furniture, and other physical objects that enhance the realism of the composited visuals. “Sets” of almost unlimited size can be created digitally because compositing software can take the blue or green colour at the edges of a backing screen and extend it to fill the rest of the frame outside it. That way, subjects recorded in modest areas can be placed in large virtual vistas.

Most common, perhaps, are set extensions: digital additions to actual performing environments. In the film Gladiator, for example, the arena and first tier seats of the Roman Colosseum were actually built, while the upper galleries (complete with moving spectators) were computer graphics, composited onto the image above the physical set. For motion pictures originally recorded on film, high-quality video conversions called “digital intermediates” enable compositing and other operations of computerized post production. Digital compositing is a type of matting, and one of four basic compositing methods. The others are physical compositing, multiple exposure, and background projection, a method which utilizes both front projection and rear projection.

 

 

Task: The art of the breakdown 

• Locate at least one compositing breakdown. Consider the following:

• what different elements of the composite can you spot?

• why has the shot been built in this way?

• why are those decisions being made?

• Green Screen: To provide flexibility in creating various environments and to insert the dragon into the scene.

• Tracking Marks: To ensure that the CGI elements align with the camera movement for a realistic composite.

• Light Reference: To maintain consistent lighting between the live-action footage and the CGI elements, which is vital for realism.

These decisions are based on the vision of the director, the capabilities of the VFX team, and the goal to create an immersive and believable fantasy world for the audience.