CGI or Animatronics

[the game]

Which do you prefer in movies? CGI or Animatronics

[jackofwind]

Doesn't matter if it's good.

Both can be equally awful to look at, but bad CGI probably grates more than bad animatronics which just look funny.

[Kumorii]

Eh, both have their place. Kinda depends what they need to do. Simple stuff, animatronics, complex stuff cgi.

People saying cgi looks bad often only take bad examples but at the same time don't know it's cgi when it's good. So most have a bias because whenever cgi is done properly you don't know it is cgi.

Good example is the psychadelic sex scene in Fight Club.

[Gallahadd]

Wherever possible, I prefer practical effects... but sometimes, they're just NOT possible.

The problem comes whe people overuse CGI and it takes all the soul out of the scene

[Nasuuna]

on the low tier, I'd take Animatronics, they will look cheesy a fun

at the tippy top tier, CGI is king, see Battle Angel Alita

mid tier its a crapshoot, there is good and bad uses for both

[Sunseeker]

There are some things one does better and some things the other does better.

I think the best movies use both.

[Asrialol]

I never get why some people say, for instance, the CGI in the new star wars movies are bad - yet they seem to think the first star wars movies are good. Like. I don't even.

[Skizzit]

Eh, both have their place. Kinda depends what they need to do. Simple stuff, animatronics, complex stuff cgi.

People saying cgi looks bad often only take bad examples but at the same time don't know it's cgi when it's good. So most have a bias because whenever cgi is done properly you don't know it is cgi.

Good example is the psychadelic sex scene in Fight Club.

That's kind of the point. CGI is a great tool when it is used to enhance things like practical effects. It is when CGI is used to completely replace real effects that things tend to look bad, especially on lower budgets when they cannot just toss more and more money at it until it looks ok. Then again, even times when they do that it can end up terrible like Superman's plastic lip in the Justice League.

[Kumorii]

That's kind of the point. CGI is a great tool when it is used to enhance things like practical effects. It is when CGI is used to completely replace real effects that things tend to look bad, especially on lower budgets when they cannot just toss more and more money at it until it looks ok. Then again, even times when they do that it can end up terrible like Superman's plastic lip in the Justice League.

Not at all. Complete cgi can also look incredible. And not everything can be enhanced. Iron man suit transformations look amazing. Transformers looked great. Rise of the planets of the apes. Hell, even first jurassic Park looked amazing with Their complete cgi shots. Life of Pi is another. New remake of lion King also looks incredible. All of these are have shots of are complete cgi movies and can't be done with practical effects.

Whenever you see large explosions or water in large environments where it's obvious it can be filmed is complete cgi. Practical effects when it comes to water and fire used to be done with miniature models. Problem is that neither fire or water behave the same in smaller scale environments. Which is why older movies that used practical miniature shots for these always looked off.

People use bad cgi as a way to show cgi is always bad but ignore all the time when it's good. Same as with everything you need to spend money and hire talented people. It's not that they use cgi or practical effects that determines if it looks good or not. It's if they are willing to spend and allocate time to make it so. Even your lip example was "fixed" by internet people which made it good cgi and no one would even know it was cgi, which shows the reason it looked awful were due to improper skill and/or time constraints rather than it being cgi.

[Super Kami Dende]

CGI, since you can do a lot more Animation wise with it.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Both can look abhorrent..

What ever fits the situation better I guess if done right.

[Skizzit]

Not at all. Complete cgi can also look incredible. And not everything can be enhanced. Iron man suit transformations look amazing. Transformers looked great. Rise of the planets of the apes. Hell, even first jurassic Park looked amazing with Their complete cgi shots. Life of Pi is another. New remake of lion King also looks incredible. All of these are have shots of are complete cgi movies and can't be done with practical effects.

Whenever you see large explosions or water in large environments where it's obvious it can be filmed is complete cgi. Practical effects when it comes to water and fire used to be done with miniature models. Problem is that neither fire or water behave the same in smaller scale environments. Which is why older movies that used practical miniature shots for these always looked off.

People use bad cgi as a way to show cgi is always bad but ignore all the time when it's good. Same as with everything you need to spend money and hire talented people. It's not that they use cgi or practical effects that determines if it looks good or not. It's if they are willing to spend and allocate time to make it so. Even your lip example was "fixed" by internet people which made it good cgi and no one would even know it was cgi, which shows the reason it looked awful were due to improper skill and/or time constraints rather than it being cgi.

So in other words, it can look ok when shit tons of money is tossed at it. Exactly what I just said.

[unbound]

Which do you prefer in movies? CGI or Animatronics

Both.

You need to view both of those as simply tools to tell the story. Use the appropriate tool given the situation.

When your only tool is a hammer, all your problems look like nails.

[Fixxit the Gnome]

I love practical effects! There's something about the effort in making something tangible and "real" in movies that one really has to appreciate. I love good CGI as well, but I feel CGI is best when you don't really notice it.

[Jotaux]

I find cgi doesn’t age well. Things that look incredible today will look horrible 10 years from now. Practical effects age but not at the same pace as cgi. Jurassic park is a good example of practical effects holding up years later.

[Rustedsaint]

I prefer practical effects more to cgi,
Like the cgi they used in the rogue one movie to replace dead people, looking at them you knew they weren’t real but a part of you thought they were real for a second

[the game]

I find cgi doesn’t age well. Things that look incredible today will look horrible 10 years from now. Practical effects age but not at the same pace as cgi. Jurassic park is a good example of practical effects holding up years later.

That's kind of where I got the idea for this thread. I was watching a video on the animatronics for jaws and jurassic park. These movies always seemed more believable somehow than the movies that use CGI.

[Easo]

Why not both? Each has it's uses. Animatronics will not really make you see pretty space battles, for example, while CGI will.

[The Stormbringer]

Why not both? Each has it's uses. Animatronics will not really make you see pretty space battles, for example, while CGI will.

Exactly. Whatever works best in a given situation is important. WETA Workshop did this with Lord of the Rings, using basically every method known to man for film trickery, and well, LotR speaks for itself.

Also, you'd be surprised how good miniatures and the like can do for space battles... look at the original Star Wars trilogy, or Red Dwarf for ship design. All of those were miniatures, if I recall.

[Ayirasi]

I have a soft spot for practical effects and animatronics (An American Werewolf in London, The Thing (1982)). Too often, CGI ages poorly (An American Werewolf in Paris, The Thing (2011)). When done right, CGI can look amazing (Jurassic Park, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes).

I tend to appreciate CGI that you barely notice (Ex Machina, Zodiac), and practical effects that are completely bonkers (Mad Max: Fury Road, The Empire Strikes Back, and anything Ray Harryhausen).

Ideally, there would be blending the two (Jurassic Park, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy), but sometimes even that gets mucked up (The Wolfman (2010), Bad Moon).