Principle of VFX – Theory & Research Development

Principles of VFX  – UWL L4

  • Total Recall (1991) directed by Paul Verhoeven – VFX and prop art

  • Godzilla (1954) directed by Ishirō Honda – Stop motion

  • The Four Troublesome Heads (1898) directed by Georges Méliès – make up and illusion

  • Nosferatu (1922) directed by F.W. Murnau – make up and illusion

  • Indiana Jones and the raiders of the lost ark (1981) directed by Steven Spielberg – VFX

  • Terminator 2 (1998) directed by James Cameron VFX and props

  • Tron (1982) directed by Steven Lisberger – early VFX

  • Luxo Jr. (1981) directed by Jon Lasseter – Animation

A Trip to the Moon (1902) directed by Georges Méliès – Prop art

  • Pirates of the Caribbean (2003) – VFX and make up

  • The Abyss (1989) directed by James Cameron

  • 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) directed by Stanley Kubrick

  • The Lord of the Rings The Two Towers (2002) directed by Peter Jackson

  • King Kong (1933)

  • Jason and the Argonauts (1963) directed by Don Chaffey

Stephen Robert Prince

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

 

Stephen Robert Prince (September 13, 1955 – December 30, 2020) was an American film critic, historian and theorist. He was a Professor of Communication Studies and was a Professor of Cinema at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (“Virginia Tech”). His books include The Warrior’s Camera: The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa (1991) and Savage Cinema: Sam Peckinpah and the Rise of Ultraviolent Movies (1998).Prince was frequently cited as an expert in East Asian cinema by Criterion and can often be heard in commentary tracks in their collections.

Through the Looking Glass

 

Investigation:

  • assignment 1

  • weekly research

  • written essay

  • referencing

 

THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS: PHILOSOPHICAL TOYS AND DIGITAL VISUAL EFFECTS.

In the article Stephen writes about early visual effects and what visual effects toys are and how they have evolved visual effects from then till now, an optical toy forms a group of devices for entertainment combined with a scientific optical illusion. these were also known as philosophical toys when they were first developed in the 1900s.People had experimented with optical phenomena since prehistoric times and played with objects that influenced the experience of light, colour and shadow. Since the 17th century optical tabletop instruments such as the compound microscope and telescope were used for parlour entertainment in richer households, other, larger devices such as peep shows were usually exhibited by travelling showmen at fairs.

The phenakistiscope, zoetrope, praxinoscope and flip book are often seen as precursors of film, leading to the invention of cinema at the end of the 19th century. In the 21st century this narrow teleological vision was questioned and qualities of these media gained renewed attention in the fields of the history of film, science, technology and art. Several philosophical toys were developed through scientific experimentation, then turned into scientific amusements that demonstrated new ideas and theories in the fields of optics, physics, electricity, mechanics, etc. and ended up as toys for children, the innovation in these effects sparked the early film industry to what it is to date.

Prince, S. (2010). Through the looking glass:Philosophical toys and digital visaul effects. Philosophical toys and digital visaul effects, 20-38.

George MARIE Jean Méliès

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

 

Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès French, Paris  8 December 1861 – 21 January 1938) was a French magician, actor, and film director. He led many technical and narrative developments in the early 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 early 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, are considered among the most important early science fiction films, though their approach is closer to fantasy.

 

Edwin S. Porter

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

 

Edwin Stanton Porter (April 21, 1870 – April 30, 1941) was an American film pioneer, most famous as a producer, director, studio manager and cinematographer with the Edison Manufacturing Company and the Famous Players Film Company. Of over 250 films created by Porter, his most important include What Happened on Twenty-third Street, New York City (1901), Jack and the Beanstalk (1902), Life of an American Fireman (1903), The Great Train Robbery (1903), The European Rest Cure (1904), The Kleptomaniac (1905), Life of a Cowboy (1906), Rescued from an Eagle’s Nest (1908), and The Prisoner of Zenda (1913).

Tom Gunning – Professor of Cinema and Media Studies, Department of Art History

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

Tom Gunning works on problems of film style and interpretation, film history and film culture. His published work (approximately one hundred publications) has concentrated on early cinema (from its origins to the WW I) as well as on the culture of modernity from which cinema arose (relating it to still photography, stage melodrama, magic lantern shows, as well as wider cultural concerns such as the tracking of criminals, the World Expositions, and Spiritualism). His concept of the “cinema of attractions” has tried to relate the development of cinema to other forces than storytelling, such as new experiences of space and time in modernity, and an emerging modern visual culture. His book D.W. Griffith and the Origins of American Narrative Film traces the ways film style interacted with new economic structures in the early American film industry and with new tasks of story telling. His forthcoming book on Fritz Lang deals with the systematic nature of the director’s oeuvre and the processes of interpretation. He has written on the Avant-Garde film, both in its European pre-World War I manifestations and the American Avant-Garde film up to the present day. He also also written on genre in Hollywood cinema and on the relation between cinema and technology. The issues of film culture, the historical factors of exhibition and criticism and spectator’s experience throughout film history are recurrent themes in his work.

cinema of attraction

 

Investigation:

  • assignment 1

  • weekly research

  • written essay

  • referencing

 

 

GUNNING, T. THE CINEMA OF ATTRACTIONS

In the book tom gunning talks about early cinema and what precisely is the cinema of attraction, Early filmmakers like Méliès and Porter use non- narratives unlike telling stories like we use today but to present a series of sequences to an audience to create a spectacle for the viewer to be more involved with the cinema creating the effects. For example, these films consisted of non-narrative sequences in a moving vehicle, the theatre itself would be arranged as a train carriage with a conductor who checked tickets to make it visually real, they also added sound effects simulating the click-clack of wheels and hiss of brakes, the experiences related more to the attraction of an amusement park rather than cinema we have today.

The term “attractions” comes from Sergei Mikhailovich Eisenstein and his attempt to find a new model and mode of analysis for theatre, according to Eisenstein, theatres should consist of a montage attraction, creating a relation to the spectator threw illusion and emotion. Film makings would use a wide range of mechanics and props to build on the illusion in film making to give a realistic feel, today the history of cinema attractions is still influencing cinema of today but non narrative film making is a thing of the past with strong narrative sequences to create film of today.

Gunning, T. (2006). The Cinema of Attraction[s]: Early Film, Its Spectator and the AvantGarde. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.

RAY HARRYHAUSEN

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • EARLY FILM EFFECTS

 

Ray Harryhausen, in full Raymond Frederick Harryhausen, (born June 29, 1920, Los Angeles, California, U.S.—died May 7, 2013, London, England) Harryhausen grew up in Los Angeles, acquiring a love of dinosaurs and fantasy at a young age. His parents encouraged his interests in films and in models, and he was inspired by the cinematic effects in such movies as The Lost World (1925) and King Kong (1933). After seeing the latter, he began experimenting with marionettes and stop-motion animation, making short films in his parents’ garage. At about age 18 he met noted animator Willis O’Brien, with whom he would later work on several projects. On O’Brien’s advice to refine his abilities, Harryhausen enrolled in art and anatomy courses at Los Angeles City College and later in film courses at the University of Southern California. It was around this time that he began developing the technique that became known as “Dynamation,” used to make it appear that actors on film are interacting with animated models.

Each of the model skeletons was about eight to 10 inches high, and six of the seven were made for the sequence. The remaining one was a veteran from The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, slightly repainted to match the new members of the family. When all the skeletons have manifested themselves to Jason and his men, they are commanded by Acetes to ‘Kill, kill, kill them all,’ and we hear an unearthly scream. What follows is a sequence. three men fighting seven skeletons, and each skeleton had five appendages to move in each separate frame of film at least 35 animation movements, each synchronized to the actors’ movements. Some days I was producing less than one second of screen time; in the end the whole sequence took a record four and a half months.

STAR WAR 1977 A NEW HOPE

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • EARLY CGI

 

First blend of CGI and live action in Star Wars (1977) This new technology was used for the trench run briefing sequence in the first Star Wars film. George Lucas brought digital to Hollywood with Star Wars.​

The 12-minute climax of STAR WARS includes the iconic ‘Trench Run’ where all the individual storylines collide, legends were made and a new filmmaking universe was born. Marica Lucas was tasked with re-editing and crafting a more compelling ending with stakes raised to the highest levels. Marcia restructured the final act with intertwining parallel action and stated:  ‘If the audience doesn’t cheer when Han Solo comes in at the last second in the Millennium Falcon to help Luke when he’s being chased by Darth Vader, the picture doesn’t work.’

Alvy Ray Smith 

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • EARLY CGI

 

   

Alvy Ray Smith III (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 & ray smith Discovers Computer Graphics

 

Investigation:

  • assignment 1

  • written essay

  • weekly research

  • referencing

 

Ray Smith, A. (1982) George Lucas Discovers Computer Graphics

The article talks about the Lucasfilm’s and his knowledge of computer graphics, the article goes on to talk about Lucasfilm was limited about computer generated graphics and he used a wide range of mechanical devices, repeatable camera dollies for blue screen shots for his films but couldn’t make picture directly by computer, due to this, Lucasfilm’s employed Ray smith to revolutionise computer-based graphics. Lucasfilm mainly being special effects with models and mechanical effects being on top, Smith tried to improve the overall computer graphics for Lucasfilm’s, with their help, Smith put together a team including Tom Duff, Bill Reeves, David DiFrancesco, Tom Porter, Loren Carpenter, Rob Cool, Jim Blinn.

Smith was given an opportunity by ILM to create a 60 second screen shot for Paramount Pictures, the contract work was for star trek 2. With the help of an extremely talented team, Smith put together a 60 second short film using all the techniques and software’s from his team. The result of using Carpenter’s fractal mountains, Reeves and his particle system, Porter’s paint program, Cook and Duffs 3d rendering and digital film expertise of David DiFrancesco created the new revolution in computer graphics.

Smith, A. R. (1998). George Lucas discover computer graphicss . IEEE annals of the history of computing , 20(2), pp. 48-49.

 

LOREN CARPENTER FRACTAL ART 

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • FRACTAL ART

 

 Loren Carpenter, co-founder of Pixar Animation Studios, he began experimenting with fractals to make his computer graphics look more realistic. This technique gave rise to software programs now widely used across the computer graphics industry to create special effects, including fictitious landscapes and imaginary worlds, such as the Genesis planet sequence in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and the damaged Death Star in Return of the Jedi.

Fractal compression converts images consisting of random information into fractal code saving only a small, representative amount of information that is later used to re-create the original image. Since the fractal image is now code instead of pixels, file size is drastically reduced and the image can be scaled to any size without losing its sharpness

Fractal geometry is being used in the biological sciences to accurately model the human lung, heartbeats and blood vessels, neurological systems and countless other physiological processes. Doctors and researchers are now using the mathematics behind fractal geometry to build models that they hope will identify microscopic patterns of diseases and abnormalities earlier than ever before.

Fractal art is a form of algorithmic art created by calculating fractal objects and representing the calculation results as still digital images, animations, and media. Fractal art developed from the mid-1980s onwards. It is a genre of computer art and digital art which are part of new media art. The mathematical beauty of fractals lies at the intersection of generative art and computer art. They combine to produce a type of abstract art.

Fractal art (especially in the western world) is rarely drawn or painted by hand. It is usually created indirectly with the assistance of fractal-generating software, iterating through three phases: setting parameters of appropriate fractal software; executing the possibly lengthy calculation; and evaluating the product. In some cases, other graphics programs are used to further modify the images produced. This is called post-processing.

computer ANNIMATION

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • animation

 

TOY STORY 1995

 

Recruiting animators for Toy Story was brisk; the magnet for talent was not mediocre pay but the allure of taking part in the first computer-animated feature, Lasseter said of the challenges of computer animation, “We had to make things look more organic. Every leaf and blade of grass had to be created. We had to give the world a sense of history. So the doors are banged up, the floors have scuffs amd the film began with animated storyboards to guide the animators in developing the characters. 27 animators worked on the film, using 400 computer models to animate the characters. Each character was first either created out of clay or modeled from a computer-drawn diagram before reaching the computer-animated design.Once the animators had a model, its articulation and motion controls were coded; this allowed each character to move in a variety of ways, such as talking, walking, or jumping. Out of all of the characters, Woody was the most complex, as he required 723 motion controls, including 212 for his face and 58 for his mouth.

COMPUTOR GENARATED GRAPHICS

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • COMPUTOR GENARATED GRAPHICS

 

VISUAL EFFECTS

ANNIHILATION 2018

ANNIHILATION is a 2018 science fiction psychological horror film written and directed by Alex Garland

STAR WARS: EPISODE III

STAR WARS: EPISODE III – REVENGE OF THE SITH is a 2005 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas

LORD OF THE RINGS 2001

LORD OF THE RINGS 2001, The Subsurface technology was Ken ​McGaugh​ and Joe Letteri who did the majority of the work for Gollum and they took a concept paper that had been written and implemented the math and the information in the paper into a shader-based system, so that they could put it onto the skin of Gollum So it’s lots of different areas of technology within Weta that put Gollum all that together.

When Eric Saindon did Gollum he was writing his own volume-preserving muscle system that allowed him to basically take a skeleton, where he would actually build the bones and everything for Gollum, and then put the muscles onto the skeleton and attached them at the proper points, as Gollum bends and moves around, the muscles would flex and move like real muscles would, and allow Gollum to get skinned through this muscle system, which was a completely different way of doing things at the time.

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN

 

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL, In the harsh light of day, Captain Barbossa’s crew in “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl” looks like any other bunch of sailors. Under the moonlight, though, the cursed pirates become otherworldly beings, shifting into skeletal buccaneers. What’s fascinating about watching these bony lads is that they’re still recognizable as individuals. You can see the structure of their faces, dreadlocks hanging down from decaying skulls, and distinct beards covering their ossified jaws. That look came courtesy of the film’s award-winning special effects team, visual effects supervisor John Knoll and VFX art director Aaron McBride, who wanted the Black Pearl’s crew to maintain their discernible features. In a behind-the-scenes look at the making of “Pirates,” director Gore Verbinski discusses how his team spent time achieving just the right balance of “alive but decomposing” for their pirates

SPECIAL EFFECTS

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • MAKE UP AND ILLUSION

Drop Dead Fred is a 1991 dark comedy fantasy film directed by Ate de Jong

Jumanji is a 1995 American urban fantasy adventure film directed by Joe Johnston

AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN PARIS 1997 

As part of the preproduction process, Stern had makeup effects (FX) artists Steve Johnson and Tony Gardner work on preliminary designs for the monster, and Phil Tippett, who had worked on Jurassic Park, was going to use computer graphics to bring the beast to life for full-body shots, while the closeups would be handled by the makeup FX crew using animatronic heads.

 

GCI COMPARISON

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • referencing

  • GCI COMPARISON

 

TERMINATOR 2 1991 VS TERMINATOR GENISYS 2015

FIRE WALK WITH ME – THEN.

​

This scene from Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) was absolutely sensational and extremely impressive back in the early ’90s, though we can see how the effects have aged.

FIRE WALK WITH ME – NOW.

​

A similar scene from Terminator Genesis (2015) also sees a Terminator emerge from the fire, only the shot is much more visually dynamic this time than it was in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, with improved fire effects and plenty of added detail, including an incandescent metal effect which highlights just how hot the machine is.

 

UNANNY VALLEY – ASSINGMENT 2

 

Investigation:

  • principle of vfx  research

  • written essay

  • ASSINGMENT 2

  • referenced

  • UNANNY VALLEY

UNANNY VALLEY – ASSINGMENT 2 – PRINCPLE OF VXF

The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn is a 2011 animated action and adventure film based on Georges Prosper Remi comic book series of the same name. It was directed by Steven Spielberg, who produced the film with Peter Jackson and Kathleen Kennedy.  It stars Jamie Bell as Tintin, Andy Serkis, and Daniel Craig. In the film Tintin, Snowy and Captain Haddock search for the treasure of the Unicorn, a ship once captained by Haddock’s ancestor Sir Francis Haddock, but they face dangerous pursuit by Ivan Ivanovitch Sakharine who is the descendant of Sir Francis’s nemesis Red Rackham.

Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson worked to make Tintin a worldwide sensation with their new animated film, but in the process, they created another obscure film that falls into the uncanny valley. The phrase can be seen straight away in early sense of The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn, the strange effects created an uneasy lifelike animation that caused the characters to look strangely wrong and fall into the valley , the Tintin character looks too human and yet not human at all, the skin on his face to smooth and with little texture making the characters face look artificial , his eyes glassy and empty instead of showing  raw emotion. the effects struggle to replicate the real-life emotions and facial expressions of a human characters and instead opts for poor-quality renders that shows nothing behind the glazed eyes and smooth pale skin of the main characters, although the animation creates a very good job at recreating objects, landscapes and creatures it really struggles with human realism, making strange and disturbing but sometimes interesting results as a computer pushes to recreate accurate facial expressions to simulate human emotions. It’s a paradox of animation that you can put arms, legs and a face on an object or make an animal talk and it will look more approachable but make the character too lifelike and the viewer no longer sees it as loveable animation and rejects the image and relates it to something wrong with the character, which falls into the uncanny valley. most early animated films stop at the uncanny valley’s edge with human like characters in movies like wally or Treasure planet which are carefully created to look like a mix of realism and cartoon. But steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson the makers of Tintin attempted to pioneer the animation industry’s final evolution by building on previous animation failures such as The Polar Express, Beowulf and Mars Needs Moms. The team at Peter Jackson’s Weta Digital developed new motion capture technology to turn live actor’s movements into more advanced animation software. The results were better for real facial emotion and movement with characters but not quite good enough for the viewer to feel completely comfortable with animation and that it doesn’t fall into the uncanny valley effect.

uncanny valley animation examples

This makes the uncanny valley sound like a new phenomenon, but filmmakers have known about it since the mid-1900s. It’s what makes many horror movies seem so scary using the uncanny valley theory as a source of horror with the lifeless human effects, an example of this is the Zombie character which are completely fantasied monsters, which come from the bottom of the uncanny valley with their dead eyes and lifeless expression on their faces. This use of uncanny valley has made countless viewers very uncomfortable and scared using obscured modelling methods, prosthetics, waxwork figures and clowns to psychologically induce terror into viewers mind, although the uncanny valley is not there yet with animated human realism films it can serve as a great source for horror creations to make the viewer uncomfortable and reject the image psychologically and see it as abnormal. the benefits of the uncanny valley are creating a near perfect human like animation that you have a sure way of fulfilling a feeling of unease for the viewer, if you’re looking to provoke those negative feelings, the uncanny valley is well adapted at creating those feelings. This theory was first hypothesized and identified by robotics professor Masahiro Mori in 1970, its phenomenon has been dogged by filmmakers, robot designers and video game designers.

example of uncanny valley in horror films

my favourite uncanny valley effect in realism horror is legion , although very simple, it has a powerful strike to becoming uncomfortable to watch, we all see a ice cream man as something enjoyable and a nice treat, so when you take a kind giving character and morph its anatomy structure to psychologically disturb the viewer it quickly becomes scary as the brain cant process the image properly, simple modelling technique’s allow you to stretch parts of the human body into unrealistic ways causing the valley effect but unlike animation with the uncanny effect, horror films take the effect as a big advantage and use the viewers emotions to benefit the production.

Masahiro Mori professor of robotics

Masahiro Mori professor of robotics first introduced the concept of the uncanny valley in 1970 from his book titled (Bukimi No Tani) phrasing it as bukimi no tani genshō (uncanny valley phenomenon) the (Bukimi no tani) book was translated literally as uncanny valley in the 1978 book (Robots: Fact, Fiction, and Prediction) written by Jasia Reichardt. Masahiro Mori’s original hypothesis states that the appearance of a robots made less human can cause some viewers to have a positive emotional response to the robots, becoming increasingly comfortable and empathetic leading to positive interaction , but when the robot becomes almost human the viewer psychologically rejects the robot and has a quick response developing strong emotional discomfort. However, as the robot’s appearance continues to become less distinguishable from that of a real life human the emotional response becomes positive once again and approaches human-to-human empathy levels. When plotted on a graph, the reactions are indicated by a steep decrease followed by a steep increase hence the “valley” part of the name in the areas where anthropomorphism is closest to reality.

This strong response from a robot with the appearance and motion of non-human and full human is the uncanny valley effect. The name represents the idea that an almost human looking robot or human animation seems very strange and uncomfortable to most viewers  and even some life like animated animals seem obscure causing the feeling of uncanniness, due to this process creators can fail to provide the emotional response required for productive human–robot interaction or animations. This principle of the uncanny valley can be used by filmmakers as an advantage by using the uncanny effect and what they know about how people respond to the effect, this helps the creator to exploit those psychological responses from the viewer to suit any disturbing creations for animations or vfx.

the robot looks cute and silly to the viewer creating a good uncanny valley effect

 

 

 

 

 

the robots eyes and mouth are to close to human faces and due to this it the viewer creastes the bad uncanny valley efect

References

Files, (. T. (Director). (2020). Uncanny Valley Explained | Why Robots, Dolls and Mannequins are Creepy [Motion Picture].

MORI, M. (2012, june 12). IEEE Spectrum. Retrieved from IEEE Spectrum: https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-uncanny-valley

rose, S. (2011). Tintin and the Uncanny Valley: when CGI gets too real. The Guardian, 1-2.