Renzatic on 23/8/2008 at 07:27

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I went in fresh earlier today. I saw the thread, read a few lines about a new facial animation technique in the opening post, and clicked the link. For the first 30 seconds or so, I didn't notice anything strange. It wasn't until later I started noticing some irregularities, and even then, I could contribute it to nothing more than a few slightly tragic facial tics.

The Heavy Rain virtual actress demonstration made my skin craw. This had me moderately fooled.

Kolya on 24/8/2008 at 17:43

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Fafhrd, I haven't seen Beowulf but I've seen other movies that used motion capturing or whatever it's called when done with a face. (facial expression capturing?)
I have some doubts that it's really cheaper to generate the scenes, even if you take reverses, camera set-ups, etc. into account. Had Emily just been placed there and told her few lines (as she had to anyway), that would have been much more efficient AND more realistic. As can be seen by the fact that everyone gushes about not being sure whether this was real or not.
But of course with computer generated characters WE CAN DO ALL THE STUFF WE NEVER COULD IN RL!! (That's what you get when you start asking "why?" usually.) And it's basically true. But with the same frequency people underestimate the background work that's necessary to create something halfway realistic. It's not a new motion capturing technique I'm excited about. It's when someone manages to put the tools provided to good use.
Gollum comes to mind. But with Gollum there had literally been tens of years of preliminary thought and sketches what this character should be like, starting with Tolkien's creation, that Jackson could build upon. At this point Gollum was a character, almost as much as you and me. He had experiences that shaped him mentally and physically. He had a life in the minds of millions of readers of LotR. That's why Gollum worked as a digital creature. But that's a rare case.
As can be seen in any TV series, much less thought goes into the "invention" of digital characters usually. They're bland and flat, even more so than their human counterparts, who aren't exactly the best actors in the world. But even the worst actor will bring some of his or her life into a role.

BlueNinja on 25/8/2008 at 01:06

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Even knowing ahead of time, I couldn't spot anything that indicated to me it was a fake.

Scots Taffer on 25/8/2008 at 05:37

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Salad dressing. But I don't want to eat it.

Fafhrd on 26/8/2008 at 04:25

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It's not so much that it's cheaper, as it is faster. An actor can do all the necessary work for a feature length film in a week or so, and then go do another project. Which does impact the bottom line, because you''re not paying your performers' per diems for months at a time, and contract negotiations probably go more smoothly as well, since scheduling is much faster, so you don't have to worry about not being able to get Actor X because they're signed on to a film that starts shooting in eight weeks, so they can't do anything else because they have to train and whatnot.