Old School Special FX vs. CGI

With heavily CGed movies like Avatar and 2012 coming out,I was wondering, which method of filmmaking do you prefer?

I voted both equally. Some things just can't be accomplished without CG, but for those things that can, you can't beat old school special effects. Take The Dark Knight, for example: the articulated truclk (semi-truck) really was flipped over end in the middle of a real street; they really did blow up the building that represented the hospital (though they had to CG windows back in as they'd been removed by the time they came to film).

Whenever something can be done for real, do it for real. If its spectacle or something beyond human control, CG it. When it could go either way, I think that would either depend on the preferance of the director or the budget.

"old school" special effects make film making an art. it's a trick to make a film more believable. Now with CG anything can be done much easier than "old school". So I voted old school.

Old school is definitely my favorite. There's just something more compelling about props and stunts that are real; they may look fake sometimes but it's still more believable than what a computer can come up with.

However, I'm not totally against CGI. There are some films, like The Lord of the Rings trilogy, where I think a solid balance can be found and those films used it wisely without overdoing it. CGI has its time and place but too often it's used out of laziness instead of helping to enhance the film.

I have to agree that sometimes CG is useful when something can't be done for real for whatever reason.

Dinosaurs, superhuman agility like flying, web swinging etc etc.

I could say there are more award winning films without CG but then it is relatively new and limited to certain genres. So that's no real argument.

I think it has it's place...but I dislike when unconvincing CG is used....it defeats the whole object...I could name names but you probaly know what/who I mean by now.

Avatar had amazing CG..a spectacle in itself...but the story was shallow and unoriginal....and I am sorry but 3D is not the rebirth of cinema!

You can use all the CG and modern gimmicks you want but your limited 1980's style sci fi stories are showing your ages and inability to keep up Cameron, Lucas, Spielberg et al.

I enjoy films like The Incredibles, and though I think there were some Scooby Doo moments like running from Balin's Tomb in Lord of the Rings, CGI can be done well.

Execution is the key and reason why films like Deathproof have any staying power. To see a well conceived and executed stunt is still unmatched. Now, putting stunts in the context of a movie which makes you CARE about the result...

I love CG (after all it is part of my major) but I also love the old school effects.

Like said earlier, it all depends if CG is done right. Movies like Peter Jackson's King Kong and Lord of the Rings have great CGI, but they also have a great story to go along with it. The CGI becomes natural because of it. But when you have movies like the SW prequels, where Lucas is trying to cram as many things as possible into every shot just because he can, it becomes too distracting. When I realized that in RotS that the only thing real on the clone troopers were their heads (when their helmets were off mind you) I found it extremely distracting and stupid. Why not just have a guy in a costume? What a waste of animation.

I do think that while CGI is nearly limitless, it's almost taken away all imagination when it comes to practicality. I haven't been "wowed" recently with CGI. Sure, Avatar looked great, but I wasn't a huge fan of the bright rainbow creature designs or the 60's acid trip planet. It looked great, but I wasn't a fan.

I especially get angry when they have CG blood in horror movies. The horror genre is a genre that I adored for it's weird and scary creations. Just seen the 2010 Wolf Man, yet nothing beats the transformation of American Werewolf in London. Or the over-the-top gore of Evil Dead. Or people getting ripped apart by zombies in Day of the Dead.

I like CGI, but I LOVE the "old school" special effects. Merely for the technical reasons but beyond.

It depends on how its done. But generally CGI is done poorly, mostly because the cant restrain themselves.

In the older days, because of the limitations of old school special effects they had to take a "less is more" approach. Concentrating more on characters and stories, only showing the monsters of the special effects sparingly. And that is what made them work. Now that they can do anything with no limits they feel the need to just be constantly showing off their latest CGI creations.

Take Jaws for example. For most of that movie all we see is a fin. And it worked. If it was being made now we'd be seeing a CGI shark swimming around the whole film, showing it eating people. And it would have none of the impact that the movie does as it is now.

Another problem is that in their eagerness of show off their CGI they forget the whole philosophy that if you notice the special effects, than they arent working. CGI should be there to make something more realistic, it shouldnt be there to showcase the special effects.
Take the original Jurassic Park for example. Almost 20 years old. Yet when I watch it today, Im seeing real dinosaurs, not special effects. Real animals that have weight, that look and move realistically. And are horrifying. And then theres Jurassic Park 3, made a decade later but everything looks so fake. They arent real animals, they are CGI movie monsters. Because the limitations of the technology in the first film kept them grounded, forced them to use other methods as well as the CGI to bring the dinosaurs to life. By the time of JP3 all they had to do was go crazy with the CGI and it failed.

So in the end theres nothing wrong with CGI. Film-makers just need to learn how to use it properly. And get past the idea that people just want to see spectacle.

I think this topic still popping up in internet forums and in general conversation so often is very telling. It shows CGI is too often badly used or overused for many people's tastes.

No one is a fan of bad or overused CG.

Pre-CG, audiences were possibly more forgiving....A crude animatronic Jaws or stop motion Kong wouldn't cut it today but was fine in the day as that's all that was possible. I think it's harder to forgive bad CG when we have experienced how it should be done many times and how genuinely convincing it can be....(Jurassic Park etc).

I remember being a kid watching Empire Strikes Back..being immersed in the film...not really noticing the FX (the whole point IMHO)...until I saw the stop animation taun taun....I was surprised such an old technique (albeit tried an trusted) was used when the rest seemed more modern. I wasn't against stop motion....it just seemed incongruous with the rest of the FX and it seemed a little like a cut corner....like cheap CG often does.

What I am trying to say is...old school is great up to a point and CG can take things to a new level...just wish the film makers would make better judgements based on what's available....credibility....cost....effectiveness..

Cheap CG is worse than a cheap real world old school effect IMO.

Here's my Opinion on the subject. I voted Both Equally, However, I do feel 100x better when I see "Old School" FX in action than CGI. So why did I vote for both? Well, let's use Star Wars as an example of a time when CGI is MUCH better.

The OT was done completely without CGI. The PT was done nearly totally CGI, and guess which one is more exciting IMO. The PT. The fact is when you're dealing with a fantastic, fictional world like Star Wars, you need to at least see what is was like. What I'm saying is if it was possible to make wide shots of Courasant, epic battles, and the plethera of unique planets using "Old School" techniques I would demand that they use them, just so I can feel good that they weren't lazy and did some work to make it look good, but that can't happen. So we have to use CGI just to get the vision across.

So that's the reason I support CGI sometimes, but what about the "Old School" stuff? Why do I love those? Reason #1- It looks (wait a minute) IS real. You can replicate a human flawlessly with CGI, but it's not a human.

I might be the only one on Earth who would say that if you stood a animated Na'avi next to a person dressed as a Na'avi the real person would make the CGed one look like a character from Toy Story. The point is you can make the most realistic CGI creation ever, but it's not real, and will never look as real as real.

Reason #2- It makes you feel good. I desperatly wish someone agrees with me on this because if you don't, the world is REALLY headed in a bad direction. When you see, or hear that some awesome effect was done using "Old School" techniques don't you just get a warm feeling, knowing that the special FX artists took the time and effort to create something rather than just whipping it up CGI-style?

To sum it up, CGI is essencial in making beautiful places and action scenes, but in mostly every movie with FX I support using the techniques we saw as kids.

It's all about the storytelling elements not the effects! Unless they seriously take away from the movie...

This pretty much sums it up for me:

http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Even-Monkeys-Recognize-The-Uncanny-Valley-17463.html

I think that humans are a little more aware of the inner workings of film and the nuances of cgi than monkeys-- and are therefore even less prone to accept it when it comes to voluntarily suspending our disbelief.

I just saw something on TV the other day that made me furious. You know the Vlasic pickle commercial,you know, the one with the traditionally animated stork that you can watch and smile just because it was one of the very few commercials that still uses traditional animation. Well guess what happened, the Vlasic stork is now CGI!!! What the HECK!!!! Like we just had to "keep up with the times" or something. This SUCKS, I hate you Vlasic!

REally dislike/hate CGI. Any heavily CGI movie is a waste to me. I would rather see straight up animation.

The Jaws comparison above sums up my exact feelings.

Saw Nightmare on Elm Street remake last night and the scene where Freddy comes through/stretches the wall was poor CGI. (Not that bad a film other than that)

The original where they did it for real using a rubber(?) wall was much better and illustrates that CGI can be used unecessarily.

Why do it with CGI when the real thing is easy, cheap and safe?

Ultimately reality is always superior to fakery.

IMHO one perfect example of a CGI vs old school = CGI epic fail.

Does anyone know of a recent movie that uses lots of animatronics or miniatures or etc. I've been looking for some recent examples after seeing the incredible Obama animatronics at Disney World's hall of presidents. I'm thinking "Why don't movies use this more often" so if you know of any, I'd like to hear them.

I typically agree with the idea that if it can be done traditionally, do it traditionally - especially if the CG counterpart not going to be exceedingly well done. (And from my understanding, depending on the shot that is wanted, a comparable level of realism with CG can sometimes be more expensive)

Also, some things just lend themselves more to CG. For example (yes, I know some purists are going to hate me for this) I was having a conversation with a friend the other day about the simultaneous 3 battles in Return of the Jedi. We concluded that the space battle didn't have quite the right scale to it and that, had CG been around, those scenes could have been significantly better. That said, using Star Wars as an example again, I prefer Muppet Yoda over CG Yoda hands down. It's all a matter of when CG should be used and when it shouldn't - and that's an art in of itself.

IAdventurer01 said:

I typically agree with the idea that if it can be done traditionally, do it traditionally - especially if the CG counterpart not going to be exceedingly well done. (And from my understanding, depending on the shot that is wanted, a comparable level of realism with CG can sometimes be more expensive)

Also, some things just lend themselves more to CG. For example (yes, I know some purists are going to hate me for this) I was having a conversation with a friend the other day about the simultaneous 3 battles in Return of the Jedi. We concluded that the space battle didn't have quite the right scale to it and that, had CG been around, those scenes could have been significantly better. That said, using Star Wars as an example again, I prefer Muppet Yoda over CG Yoda hands down. It's all a matter of when CG should be used and when it shouldn't - and that's an art in of itself.

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Gotta agree with that.

As much as the CG in the Star Wars prequels became overbearing at times the space scenes really worked because of it. CG done well, story and characterisation not so much.

I guess fake stuff can seem more realistic than real stuff when using CGI.

I picked old school. I mean there are some things you can't do without CG, but when you can really take the time and the effort of putting a whole movie together using the old school method and make it work, then thats something special.