9 ms·

Goodbye Uncanny Valley [video]

197 points by shawndumas 9y ago

tfha 9y ago
Overall a really solid video about the modern state of computer graphics, with a comprehensive tour of the cutting edge realism of light and fluid, the current tricks and limitations used in the modern cutting edge, and then an exploration of the artists and formats that strive to be on the cutting edge of computer graphics while also not aiming for realism.
SubiculumCode 9y ago
Sure graphics are looking amazing...but I still think we are in the uncanny valley. Especially when it comes to faces.
- arianvanp 9y ago
  I agree. Rogue one was a great example. I found it very disturbing. Both Tarkin's and Leia's face
  - tclancy 9y ago
    Right and even when it was just about perfect it's unsettling because you get taken out of the moment wondering, "Am I looking at a real person or CGI"?
  - SubiculumCode 9y ago
    It isn't so much the faces look either, but how the faces move. Movement is often too slow, too long, too regular...and ill-timed.
    - panic 9y ago
      Yes! Motion is key. It's not enough to be photorealistic -- you need to be "videorealistic" as well.
      - iainmerrick 9y ago
        Is that something deep learning could tackle? (asking as a complete non-expert in DL) It feels like a similar problem to realistic speech synthesis, and there have been some really impressive TTS demos recently. Athough on that note, how come Google can produce these amazing speech synthesis demos, but Google Maps still sounds robotic when giving directions? Is there some big problem around generalizing or productionizing the technology? Is there some hidden trickery behind the demos?
      - SubiculumCode 9y ago
        I'd have thought that putting tracking dots on a person's face could have solved some of these things.
        khedoros1 9y ago
        I think that's what they did, though. http://www.indiewire.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/an1-274065.jpg http://www.indiewire.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/an1-2740...
    - deleted 9y ago
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  - djrogers 9y ago
    I went in to the movie not knowing that Tarkin was CGI - I assumed he was a stand-in and makeup - and came away none the wiser. After I was told he was CG, it was obvious and weird... Wonder how much of the uncanny valley stuff left is in our heads?
    - TillE 9y ago
      I know a few people had that reaction, but I went in blind too and the CGI was painfully obvious. They had close-ups of Tarkin which looked really terrible. CGI is superb at creating indistinguishable still images, but animation is still riddled with problems.
      - flamedoge 9y ago
        animation was too "perfect" in my eyes.
        Chaebixi 9y ago
        he looked like a wax figure from madame tussauds that was animate
        falcolas 9y ago
        At least wax figurines get lit realistically, the one place most CGI seems to fail.
    - qznc 9y ago
      It is easy to A-B test. Maybe someone has done that already?
      - anderspitman 9y ago
        What would you ask the test subjects though? Seems to me as soon as you say anything regarding realism a lot percentage would notice things they wouldn't have before. I'm sure a clever experiment designer could come up with something though.
  - koonsolo 9y ago
    Me too, but a friend of mine hadn't noticed that certain characters were CGI, so it must work for some of us.
- dschep 9y ago
  Agreed. And I always associated the uncanny valley with representations of humans, not terrain, robots, etc.
- bitwize 9y ago
  I urge you to watch Blade Runner 2049. Minor spoiler: there is a scene involving Rachael. They brought in the original actress and de-aged her face digitally to look like she did in her 20s and the effect was... mind-bogglingly close to perfect. Easily the best facial CG I've seen so far.
  - mrec 9y ago
    > They brought in the original actress and de-aged her face digitally No, Sean Young (the original Rachael) was brought in to consult, but the CGI face was superimposed on a stand-in, Loren Peta [1]. I saw the movie on Monday and wasn't impressed with the quality there; worse than Rogue One Tarkin and on a par with Rogue One Leia. As many others have opined in this thread, the technology's fine for stills but really, really not there for animation. YMMV, obviously. I have a friend who made it about a third of the way through Zemeckis' 2007 Beowulf before asking "hey, why did it all just go CGI?", and that movie wasn't remotely aiming for photorealism. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blade_Runner_2049#Cast https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blade_Runner_2049#Cast
- bsenftner 9y ago
  It may be a while. We have a large amount of evolutionary neural instinct when it comes to human facial recognition. Realize that camouflage in nature is very common, and as a result our ability to distinguish a real human face from a predator imposter has our entire evolution and survival baked in.
DougN7 9y ago
I've discovered something akin to the uncanny valley - 4K video. It looks so sharp and clear it feels artificial. Not sure how long it will take to get used to.
- jinushaun 9y ago
  Agree. 4K video + high FPS makes real life look 3D graphics.
  - SurrealSoul 9y ago
    I think we just need more "real life" events in 4k video and high fps. Right now the only thing associated with that is 3d graphics in video games
    - fenwick67 9y ago
      Some sports are broadcast in high FPS IIRC, but not in 4K (which would be great).
      - kuschku 9y ago
        Actually, Sky broadcasts all Bundesliga and world cup games in 4K at 60fps.
- fenwick67 9y ago
  60FPS movies do this to me - everything tends to look like a stage play.
  - marzell 9y ago
    Actual movies in 60fps, or movies in ~24fps on a TV that is using interpolation to produce 60fps output? The interpolated/faked experience is often known as Soap Opera Effect [1]. I really dislike interpolated video, but really do enjoy 'real' 60fps video. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_interpolation#Soap_opera_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_interpolation#Soap_oper...
jinushaun 9y ago
No. The landscape and nature in that video didn't even look real--never mind people.
- ygra 9y ago
  The pulldown may have helped in that impression, as pretty much every camera motion was jerky ...
  - adwi 9y ago
    For those interested and unfamiliar, “pulldown” here refers to converting frame rates between different video standards by doubling up or blending frames at regularly spaced intervals, which can introduce a visual artifact called judder which is apparent in those clips. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-two_pull_down https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-two_pull_down
  - nitrogen 9y ago
    For some reason the video was uploaded at 25fps which almost never plays right on computers, and frame-by-frame playback shows the skipping is baked into the video. I got bored counting frames to figure out what the source framerate might have been, if there was a consistent source rate.
- sgift 9y ago
  In my experience the moment people know that something is CGI they get into some kind of "extra scrutinize" mode, which moves the goal. A study showing people videos and asking them to point out CGI vs real would be far more interesting to me.
  - jinushaun 9y ago
    Nah. The landscape and plants were too shiny and high contrast. Everything looked plastic. There were some convincing ones in the video though, such as Avengers and the truck demo.
- sp332 9y ago
y4mi 9y ago
Yeah,no. We're not even close to passing the uncanny valley in movies or games We might ve passed it in pictures, but that's kinda old news at this point.
two2two 9y ago
05:56> as computers graphics get better, we believe all images less This nugget in the video struck me most. I remember when I began trusting images less once I understood the capabilities modern photo software provided. We've now achieved this with most physical forms in motion picture, short of humans. Which is not to say we won't soon. Once that threshold is crossed, then what's next? Eventually virtual reality, augmented reality, and finally reality reality. We'll trust everything we see (and eventually hear/taste/smell/feel) far less than we do now.
- binarymax 9y ago
  Indeed! I remember this being discussed as early as 1993, in the film "Rising Sun" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107969/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107969/ Another good example is https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bp-and-the-gulf-oil-spill-misadventures-in-photoshop/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bp-and-the-gulf-oil-spill-misad... ...which I remember being a wake-up call to those who didn't know it had already been going on for a couple decades. I truly wonder how much of what is presented in the MSM these days is actually not real and manages to slip by...
  - javajosh 9y ago
    On another note, did Michael Crichton ever apologize for that book? It was alarmist xenophobia targeting the Japanese, verging on racism, and one of the reasons I stopped reading him. (Watching history unfold in a way totally unlike his dark, paranoid vision has been a great pleasure.)
    - deleted 9y ago
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    - deleted 9y ago
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    - Cacti 9y ago
      That was a quarter of a century ago. Maybe you should let go?
rdoherty 9y ago
Related video about why people think CGI sucks or is still in the uncanny valley: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL6hp8BKB24 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL6hp8BKB24 Basically we consider CGI bad because we only see bad CGI. If it's used properly and the director/creator understands its limitations we either don't notice it or use our suspension of disbelief and don't care.
hughes 9y ago
We have gotten very good at nearly perfectly rendering images that accurately capture the behavior of light and materials, but I feel like to produce truly convincing CGI we need to improve the imperfections that we have come to expect from more traditional media. As other commenters pointed out here, the opening nature valley scene was unconvincing. I think this is partly due to the author not having modeled the limitations that affect physically filming a similar scene. - a helicopter or airplane could not plausibly move along the track shown in the opening shot - camera rigs have imperfect tracking control, sometimes biased along certain axes - high res 4k sensors have physical limits and defects. the scene is rendered as if captured by a totally perfect sensor Simulating the motion of a helicopter that doesn't even appear in the shot seems well beyond the effort that most digital artists are willing to go to, but I think these sort of things are key to producing something truly convincing.
- pixelbeat__ 9y ago
  That's the point. The opening scene is the uncanny valley and supposed to be not quite realistic
  - colordrops 9y ago
    That was my read as well. He even intentionally dropped the frame rate.
- Balgair 9y ago
  In addition to that list, there are the physical issues of film and optical devices. CGI can just work around them, but with film and lenses, physics still gets yah. For reference (http://www.quadibloc.com/science/opt0505.htm http://www.quadibloc.com/science/opt0505.htm) the first order optical issues with all systems are: > Spherical Aberration: this is the aberration affecting rays from a point on the optical axis; because rays from this point going out in different directions pass through different parts of the lens, then, if the lens is spherical, or otherwise not the exact shape needed to bring them all to a focus, then these rays will not all be focused at the same point on the other side of the lens. Essentially, lenses are spherical, they need to be parabolic but that is very expensive. > Coma: this aberration affects rays from points off the optical axis. If spherical aberration is eliminated, different parts of the lens bring rays from the axis to the same focus. But the place where the image of an off-axis point is formed may still change when different parts of the lens are considered. Essentially, your lens may not be flat compared to the film. > Astigmatism: this is another aberration affecting rays from a point off the optical axis. These rays, as they head through the lens to the point in the image where they will be focused, pass through a lens that is, from their perspective, tilted. Even if neither spherical aberration nor coma prevents them from coming to a sharp focus, if we consider the rays of light that are in the plane of the tilt, and the rays of light that are in the plane perpendicular to that, these rays pass through a part of the lens with a different profile. So they may not be focused at the same distance from the lens, even if they do come to a focus in each case. Essentially, lenses aren't perfectly spherical and may have a more cylindrical portion. > Curvature of Field: even when light from every point in the object is brought to a sharp focus, the points at which they are brought into focus might lie on a curved surface instead of a flat plane. Essentially, lenses are round, and film is flat. > Chromatic aberration: Essentially, red light focuses at a different distance than blue. This is the reason for rainbows.
serg_chernata 9y ago
I have to say, the most recent Planet of the Apes was seriously impressive. It's the closest I've ever been to admitting that something looks indistinguishable from reality. However, they are animals and arguably I don't spend nearly as much time looking at apes as I do at human beings. Still renders of humans may look very close but anything in motion still looks completely fake.
- dkobran 9y ago
  Totally agree though the concept of the uncanny valley is based on computer generated or robotic representations of humans specifically -- not other forms of life or inanimate objects. Meaning, not just realism in general.
- mark-r 9y ago
  The one that did it for me was Disney's remake of The Jungle Book.
sixQuarks 9y ago
Some environments pass the uncanny valley in video, namely vehicles, architecture, nature - but complex things like smoke from a large fire are still ridiculously non-realistic.
terminado 9y ago
Except half of the modern popular video content discussed in this clip represents evermore uncanny depths of said surreal valley. Overly glossy blockbuster movie FX sequences, subversive glitch gif style viral media, vaporwave, and so on. So, maybe the title is something like: Warm Hugs For the Uncanny Valley And Other CGI Oddities
lifty 9y ago
Here is a photo realistic demo video made using Unreal Engine 4.0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3LtFrMAvQ4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3LtFrMAvQ4 It's quite impressive how close they are getting to photo realistic rendering. Keep in mind, this is done in real time.
- olegkikin 9y ago
  It's not real time, all the lighting is pre-baked, that's why all the scenes are completely static. I find this quite impressive: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biB7-9qtE_Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biB7-9qtE_Y
stillkicking 9y ago
There's still a huge tell in contemporary CGI, which is pretty obvious when compared side by side to older, practical effects: smoke and light scattering. Given the amount of destructive action we typically get on screen, the picture should quickly devolve into a murky, misty mess that takes ages to settle down. But of course it doesn't, because the audience needs to be able to see the spectacle. If the scene is composited digitally out of differently rendered layers, the light won't scatter and occlude correctly through the mist. There's a reason why e.g. the original Blade Runner still looks so timelessly atmospheric compared to your run-of-the-mill dystopian cyberpunk city of today. In that sense, we've been in the age of post-real CGI for much longer than the quest for photorealism suggests. We're not actually seeking photorealism, we're seeking the hyperstimulus version of it that obeys cartoon physics more than real physics. Simulating fire, smoke and fluids is one thing, but simulating realistic combustion, fogging and drainage is quite another. Then again, you could make exactly the same observation about cars that explode upon flipping over, or the jumping bus scene in Speed. In real life it made a tiny hop and then smashed its front wheels. Magicians don't need CGI either.
- deleted 9y ago
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- Merad 9y ago
  I don't know about that. CGI effects are everywhere in modern film and TV, but I rarely hear people talking about them except in the case of action scenes or "obviously CGI" (fantasy/fictional) creatures. Take a look at the VFX highlights reel from season 1 of Game of Thrones [1]. Even 8 years ago they were using CGI throughout the show's environments. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpjdpDx8_l8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpjdpDx8_l8
  - bsenftner 9y ago
    "Everywhere" is right. Case in point, that old show "Ugly Betty" made major use of virtual sets: https://vimeo.com/19274597 https://vimeo.com/19274597
- osteele 9y ago
bitL 9y ago
Awesome video! Thanks for creating it!
falcolas 9y ago
Dear videographers, when you pick a "photorealistic" opening scene, make sure the first major object you see (the palm tree) doesn't look like its made of plastic. It also helps if you don't try and mix close up objects on far away objects (the transition from grass to what appears to be a white-sand delta or a glacier). Also, if it is a glacier, snow and running water reflect light very differently. Just three points in the first 10 seconds which puts "the battle for photo-real CGI has been won" on awful shaky ground. It seems, to me, like photorealism is currently possible for static images, but the moment you add motion, it all goes to hell.
- DanBC 9y ago
  It's a shame you responded only to the title, because the content of the video is much better.
  - falcolas 9y ago
    Time constraints, a rather visceral disagreement with the premise, and bouncing ogres on chairs (so avant-garde!) have postponed completion of the video for me.
    - falcolas 9y ago
      So, watched the whole video finally (such a salty response to having to postpone watching more than the intro). I still think the premise is fundamentally flawed. The author tries to get around this by initially defining the uncanny valley as "how we got to today's CGI", and later by calling it "bad CGI" - but by either definition, there was no "good" cgi being shown; no truly post-uncanny valley content. Admiral Tarken? Princess Leia? Faked Obama? All examples of "beyond", and all really, well, uncanny to watch. I can't even honestly agree that the commercialized software has started to plateau. The software to create CGI - especially the software being used by the big studios - is evolving constantly. Even Blender changes on a monthly (or more frequent) basis. For example, in How to Train Your Dragon, one person's time was solely devoted to improving the water splash dynamics. In Frozen, they devoted decades of processing time to rendering one 15 second scene with the ice castle. In Mad Max, the CGI was praised because it wasn't the primary method of creating the effects, because it didn't get in the way of the practical effects. Can we eventually get there? Yeah, I think so. But we're not there yet. The software isn't finished; the hardware isn't fast enough. Perhaps it will come about in tandem with general AI.
ghostcluster 9y ago
Unfortunately, a lot of this video essay consists of ideological political speculation from a very narrow perspective. His history of the industry was very handwavey as well, the requisite prelude before political grandstanding.
- ch4s3 9y ago
  > prelude before political grandstanding What are you talking about, and did you watch the whole thing? It seemed to mostly be about the potential future of CGI as art and its place in contemporary/future culture.
frik 9y ago
We are still not there. Press pause button on a CGI heavy movie like "2012". The effects work if they are in motion. But looking at them in "pause mode" on 1080p it looks like shit hits the fan. The same for Transformer movies. 90% is real world material with green screen background CGI effects. There are still way too many physical effects going on. And many directors went back to do more physical stunts, because the end CGI-only result was easily spotted and universally hated by the audience. Jurassic Park 1993 had only 18 minutes of dinosaur screen footage of - 95% of them were miniatures, costumes and hydraulic mechanical robots. Only a very short T-Rex running sequence was rendered with CGI with the predecessor of OpenGL rendered on Silicon Graphics hardware. The good thing is, even today the movie (shot in analog) can be viewed in 2k or even 4k. They will have to re-render "2012" and the Transformer movies for 4k and 8k in near future. Also the real time rendering is behind, video games still can't render 2005 era movie quality in real time, let alone 2017 era quality. So a bit pre-mature to call it "goodbye". The progress is great, but there is a road ahead for sure.
brador 9y ago
Only at a distance. Failure to extend research into vector textures over bit textures in the 80s now means 3D objects look blurred when close up. A big deal in VR and AR applications.
ttoinou 9y ago
I have yet to see a movie that tries to mimic what our eyes really see (with all the weird diffraction effect we have with our pupil and eyebrows, and some particles moving in the liquid in front of our eyes)
curiouslyme 9y ago
When I started watching the video, I thought "yep, this clip is a perfect example of uncanny valley" and kept waiting for them to switch to a clip that was actually photorealistic. Nope, turns out they seem to think the splash video is realistic. The whole video has tons of obvious flaws and overall feels wrong. I don't know if I have superman vision or what here...
samfriedman 9y ago
I was really blown away by one of the video clips this video uses [0]. It's a tech demo for a "zones" effect in VR. Really interesting effect that I could see being a lot of fun in a Sci-Fi game (wormhole travel). [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D-8kkH1KPE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D-8kkH1KPE
peterashford 9y ago
The author doesn't seem aware that "The Uncanny Valley" refers to the inability to make simulated humans appear natural, not making CGI in general look natural. Very annoying seeing someone use a term with a very specific meaning and not understanding it
- robclewley 9y ago
  I agree. The author's claim on the video that it's "common" now to use the term more widely is strange to me. I've never heard of it used in the more wide sense since the term became widespread, and I've worked in computer science research since the '90s. No citation given ...

197 points by shawndumas 9y ago

tfha 9y ago

Overall a really solid video about the modern state of computer graphics, with a comprehensive tour of the cutting edge realism of light and fluid, the current tricks and limitations used in the modern cutting edge, and then an exploration of the artists and formats that strive to be on the cutting edge of computer graphics while also not aiming for realism.

SubiculumCode 9y ago

Sure graphics are looking amazing...but I still think we are in the uncanny valley. Especially when it comes to faces.

arianvanp 9y ago
I agree. Rogue one was a great example. I found it very disturbing. Both Tarkin's and Leia's face
- tclancy 9y ago
  Right and even when it was just about perfect it's unsettling because you get taken out of the moment wondering, "Am I looking at a real person or CGI"?
- SubiculumCode 9y ago
  It isn't so much the faces look either, but how the faces move. Movement is often too slow, too long, too regular...and ill-timed.
  - panic 9y ago
    Yes! Motion is key. It's not enough to be photorealistic -- you need to be "videorealistic" as well.
    - iainmerrick 9y ago
      Is that something deep learning could tackle? (asking as a complete non-expert in DL) It feels like a similar problem to realistic speech synthesis, and there have been some really impressive TTS demos recently. Athough on that note, how come Google can produce these amazing speech synthesis demos, but Google Maps still sounds robotic when giving directions? Is there some big problem around generalizing or productionizing the technology? Is there some hidden trickery behind the demos?
    - SubiculumCode 9y ago
      I'd have thought that putting tracking dots on a person's face could have solved some of these things.
      - khedoros1 9y ago
        I think that's what they did, though. http://www.indiewire.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/an1-274065.jpg http://www.indiewire.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/an1-2740...
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- djrogers 9y ago
  I went in to the movie not knowing that Tarkin was CGI - I assumed he was a stand-in and makeup - and came away none the wiser. After I was told he was CG, it was obvious and weird... Wonder how much of the uncanny valley stuff left is in our heads?
  - TillE 9y ago
    I know a few people had that reaction, but I went in blind too and the CGI was painfully obvious. They had close-ups of Tarkin which looked really terrible. CGI is superb at creating indistinguishable still images, but animation is still riddled with problems.
    - flamedoge 9y ago
      animation was too "perfect" in my eyes.
      - Chaebixi 9y ago
        he looked like a wax figure from madame tussauds that was animate
        falcolas 9y ago
        At least wax figurines get lit realistically, the one place most CGI seems to fail.
  - qznc 9y ago
    It is easy to A-B test. Maybe someone has done that already?
    - anderspitman 9y ago
      What would you ask the test subjects though? Seems to me as soon as you say anything regarding realism a lot percentage would notice things they wouldn't have before. I'm sure a clever experiment designer could come up with something though.
- koonsolo 9y ago
  Me too, but a friend of mine hadn't noticed that certain characters were CGI, so it must work for some of us.
dschep 9y ago
Agreed. And I always associated the uncanny valley with representations of humans, not terrain, robots, etc.
bitwize 9y ago
I urge you to watch Blade Runner 2049. Minor spoiler: there is a scene involving Rachael. They brought in the original actress and de-aged her face digitally to look like she did in her 20s and the effect was... mind-bogglingly close to perfect. Easily the best facial CG I've seen so far.
- mrec 9y ago
  > They brought in the original actress and de-aged her face digitally No, Sean Young (the original Rachael) was brought in to consult, but the CGI face was superimposed on a stand-in, Loren Peta [1]. I saw the movie on Monday and wasn't impressed with the quality there; worse than Rogue One Tarkin and on a par with Rogue One Leia. As many others have opined in this thread, the technology's fine for stills but really, really not there for animation. YMMV, obviously. I have a friend who made it about a third of the way through Zemeckis' 2007 Beowulf before asking "hey, why did it all just go CGI?", and that movie wasn't remotely aiming for photorealism. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blade_Runner_2049#Cast https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blade_Runner_2049#Cast
bsenftner 9y ago
It may be a while. We have a large amount of evolutionary neural instinct when it comes to human facial recognition. Realize that camouflage in nature is very common, and as a result our ability to distinguish a real human face from a predator imposter has our entire evolution and survival baked in.

DougN7 9y ago

I've discovered something akin to the uncanny valley - 4K video. It looks so sharp and clear it feels artificial. Not sure how long it will take to get used to.

jinushaun 9y ago
Agree. 4K video + high FPS makes real life look 3D graphics.
- SurrealSoul 9y ago
  I think we just need more "real life" events in 4k video and high fps. Right now the only thing associated with that is 3d graphics in video games
  - fenwick67 9y ago
    Some sports are broadcast in high FPS IIRC, but not in 4K (which would be great).
    - kuschku 9y ago
      Actually, Sky broadcasts all Bundesliga and world cup games in 4K at 60fps.
fenwick67 9y ago
60FPS movies do this to me - everything tends to look like a stage play.
- marzell 9y ago
  Actual movies in 60fps, or movies in ~24fps on a TV that is using interpolation to produce 60fps output? The interpolated/faked experience is often known as Soap Opera Effect [1]. I really dislike interpolated video, but really do enjoy 'real' 60fps video. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_interpolation#Soap_opera_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_interpolation#Soap_oper...

jinushaun 9y ago

No. The landscape and nature in that video didn't even look real--never mind people.

ygra 9y ago
The pulldown may have helped in that impression, as pretty much every camera motion was jerky ...
- adwi 9y ago
  For those interested and unfamiliar, “pulldown” here refers to converting frame rates between different video standards by doubling up or blending frames at regularly spaced intervals, which can introduce a visual artifact called judder which is apparent in those clips. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-two_pull_down https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-two_pull_down
- nitrogen 9y ago
  For some reason the video was uploaded at 25fps which almost never plays right on computers, and frame-by-frame playback shows the skipping is baked into the video. I got bored counting frames to figure out what the source framerate might have been, if there was a consistent source rate.
sgift 9y ago
In my experience the moment people know that something is CGI they get into some kind of "extra scrutinize" mode, which moves the goal. A study showing people videos and asking them to point out CGI vs real would be far more interesting to me.
- jinushaun 9y ago
  Nah. The landscape and plants were too shiny and high contrast. Everything looked plastic. There were some convincing ones in the video though, such as Avengers and the truck demo.
sp332 9y ago

y4mi 9y ago

Yeah,no. We're not even close to passing the uncanny valley in movies or games We might ve passed it in pictures, but that's kinda old news at this point.

two2two 9y ago

05:56> as computers graphics get better, we believe all images less This nugget in the video struck me most. I remember when I began trusting images less once I understood the capabilities modern photo software provided. We've now achieved this with most physical forms in motion picture, short of humans. Which is not to say we won't soon. Once that threshold is crossed, then what's next? Eventually virtual reality, augmented reality, and finally reality reality. We'll trust everything we see (and eventually hear/taste/smell/feel) far less than we do now.

binarymax 9y ago
Indeed! I remember this being discussed as early as 1993, in the film "Rising Sun" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107969/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107969/ Another good example is https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bp-and-the-gulf-oil-spill-misadventures-in-photoshop/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bp-and-the-gulf-oil-spill-misad... ...which I remember being a wake-up call to those who didn't know it had already been going on for a couple decades. I truly wonder how much of what is presented in the MSM these days is actually not real and manages to slip by...
- javajosh 9y ago
  On another note, did Michael Crichton ever apologize for that book? It was alarmist xenophobia targeting the Japanese, verging on racism, and one of the reasons I stopped reading him. (Watching history unfold in a way totally unlike his dark, paranoid vision has been a great pleasure.)
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  - Cacti 9y ago
    That was a quarter of a century ago. Maybe you should let go?

rdoherty 9y ago

Related video about why people think CGI sucks or is still in the uncanny valley: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL6hp8BKB24 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL6hp8BKB24 Basically we consider CGI bad because we only see bad CGI. If it's used properly and the director/creator understands its limitations we either don't notice it or use our suspension of disbelief and don't care.

hughes 9y ago

We have gotten very good at nearly perfectly rendering images that accurately capture the behavior of light and materials, but I feel like to produce truly convincing CGI we need to improve the imperfections that we have come to expect from more traditional media. As other commenters pointed out here, the opening nature valley scene was unconvincing. I think this is partly due to the author not having modeled the limitations that affect physically filming a similar scene. - a helicopter or airplane could not plausibly move along the track shown in the opening shot - camera rigs have imperfect tracking control, sometimes biased along certain axes - high res 4k sensors have physical limits and defects. the scene is rendered as if captured by a totally perfect sensor Simulating the motion of a helicopter that doesn't even appear in the shot seems well beyond the effort that most digital artists are willing to go to, but I think these sort of things are key to producing something truly convincing.

pixelbeat__ 9y ago
That's the point. The opening scene is the uncanny valley and supposed to be not quite realistic
- colordrops 9y ago
  That was my read as well. He even intentionally dropped the frame rate.
Balgair 9y ago
In addition to that list, there are the physical issues of film and optical devices. CGI can just work around them, but with film and lenses, physics still gets yah. For reference (http://www.quadibloc.com/science/opt0505.htm http://www.quadibloc.com/science/opt0505.htm) the first order optical issues with all systems are: > Spherical Aberration: this is the aberration affecting rays from a point on the optical axis; because rays from this point going out in different directions pass through different parts of the lens, then, if the lens is spherical, or otherwise not the exact shape needed to bring them all to a focus, then these rays will not all be focused at the same point on the other side of the lens. Essentially, lenses are spherical, they need to be parabolic but that is very expensive. > Coma: this aberration affects rays from points off the optical axis. If spherical aberration is eliminated, different parts of the lens bring rays from the axis to the same focus. But the place where the image of an off-axis point is formed may still change when different parts of the lens are considered. Essentially, your lens may not be flat compared to the film. > Astigmatism: this is another aberration affecting rays from a point off the optical axis. These rays, as they head through the lens to the point in the image where they will be focused, pass through a lens that is, from their perspective, tilted. Even if neither spherical aberration nor coma prevents them from coming to a sharp focus, if we consider the rays of light that are in the plane of the tilt, and the rays of light that are in the plane perpendicular to that, these rays pass through a part of the lens with a different profile. So they may not be focused at the same distance from the lens, even if they do come to a focus in each case. Essentially, lenses aren't perfectly spherical and may have a more cylindrical portion. > Curvature of Field: even when light from every point in the object is brought to a sharp focus, the points at which they are brought into focus might lie on a curved surface instead of a flat plane. Essentially, lenses are round, and film is flat. > Chromatic aberration: Essentially, red light focuses at a different distance than blue. This is the reason for rainbows.

serg_chernata 9y ago

I have to say, the most recent Planet of the Apes was seriously impressive. It's the closest I've ever been to admitting that something looks indistinguishable from reality. However, they are animals and arguably I don't spend nearly as much time looking at apes as I do at human beings. Still renders of humans may look very close but anything in motion still looks completely fake.

dkobran 9y ago
Totally agree though the concept of the uncanny valley is based on computer generated or robotic representations of humans specifically -- not other forms of life or inanimate objects. Meaning, not just realism in general.
mark-r 9y ago
The one that did it for me was Disney's remake of The Jungle Book.

sixQuarks 9y ago

Some environments pass the uncanny valley in video, namely vehicles, architecture, nature - but complex things like smoke from a large fire are still ridiculously non-realistic.

terminado 9y ago

Except half of the modern popular video content discussed in this clip represents evermore uncanny depths of said surreal valley. Overly glossy blockbuster movie FX sequences, subversive glitch gif style viral media, vaporwave, and so on. So, maybe the title is something like: Warm Hugs For the Uncanny Valley And Other CGI Oddities

lifty 9y ago

Here is a photo realistic demo video made using Unreal Engine 4.0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3LtFrMAvQ4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3LtFrMAvQ4 It's quite impressive how close they are getting to photo realistic rendering. Keep in mind, this is done in real time.

olegkikin 9y ago
It's not real time, all the lighting is pre-baked, that's why all the scenes are completely static. I find this quite impressive: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biB7-9qtE_Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biB7-9qtE_Y

stillkicking 9y ago

There's still a huge tell in contemporary CGI, which is pretty obvious when compared side by side to older, practical effects: smoke and light scattering. Given the amount of destructive action we typically get on screen, the picture should quickly devolve into a murky, misty mess that takes ages to settle down. But of course it doesn't, because the audience needs to be able to see the spectacle. If the scene is composited digitally out of differently rendered layers, the light won't scatter and occlude correctly through the mist. There's a reason why e.g. the original Blade Runner still looks so timelessly atmospheric compared to your run-of-the-mill dystopian cyberpunk city of today. In that sense, we've been in the age of post-real CGI for much longer than the quest for photorealism suggests. We're not actually seeking photorealism, we're seeking the hyperstimulus version of it that obeys cartoon physics more than real physics. Simulating fire, smoke and fluids is one thing, but simulating realistic combustion, fogging and drainage is quite another. Then again, you could make exactly the same observation about cars that explode upon flipping over, or the jumping bus scene in Speed. In real life it made a tiny hop and then smashed its front wheels. Magicians don't need CGI either.

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Merad 9y ago
I don't know about that. CGI effects are everywhere in modern film and TV, but I rarely hear people talking about them except in the case of action scenes or "obviously CGI" (fantasy/fictional) creatures. Take a look at the VFX highlights reel from season 1 of Game of Thrones [1]. Even 8 years ago they were using CGI throughout the show's environments. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpjdpDx8_l8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpjdpDx8_l8
- bsenftner 9y ago
  "Everywhere" is right. Case in point, that old show "Ugly Betty" made major use of virtual sets: https://vimeo.com/19274597 https://vimeo.com/19274597
osteele 9y ago

bitL 9y ago

Awesome video! Thanks for creating it!

falcolas 9y ago

Dear videographers, when you pick a "photorealistic" opening scene, make sure the first major object you see (the palm tree) doesn't look like its made of plastic. It also helps if you don't try and mix close up objects on far away objects (the transition from grass to what appears to be a white-sand delta or a glacier). Also, if it is a glacier, snow and running water reflect light very differently. Just three points in the first 10 seconds which puts "the battle for photo-real CGI has been won" on awful shaky ground. It seems, to me, like photorealism is currently possible for static images, but the moment you add motion, it all goes to hell.

DanBC 9y ago
It's a shame you responded only to the title, because the content of the video is much better.
- falcolas 9y ago
  Time constraints, a rather visceral disagreement with the premise, and bouncing ogres on chairs (so avant-garde!) have postponed completion of the video for me.
  - falcolas 9y ago
    So, watched the whole video finally (such a salty response to having to postpone watching more than the intro). I still think the premise is fundamentally flawed. The author tries to get around this by initially defining the uncanny valley as "how we got to today's CGI", and later by calling it "bad CGI" - but by either definition, there was no "good" cgi being shown; no truly post-uncanny valley content. Admiral Tarken? Princess Leia? Faked Obama? All examples of "beyond", and all really, well, uncanny to watch. I can't even honestly agree that the commercialized software has started to plateau. The software to create CGI - especially the software being used by the big studios - is evolving constantly. Even Blender changes on a monthly (or more frequent) basis. For example, in How to Train Your Dragon, one person's time was solely devoted to improving the water splash dynamics. In Frozen, they devoted decades of processing time to rendering one 15 second scene with the ice castle. In Mad Max, the CGI was praised because it wasn't the primary method of creating the effects, because it didn't get in the way of the practical effects. Can we eventually get there? Yeah, I think so. But we're not there yet. The software isn't finished; the hardware isn't fast enough. Perhaps it will come about in tandem with general AI.

ghostcluster 9y ago

Unfortunately, a lot of this video essay consists of ideological political speculation from a very narrow perspective. His history of the industry was very handwavey as well, the requisite prelude before political grandstanding.

ch4s3 9y ago
> prelude before political grandstanding What are you talking about, and did you watch the whole thing? It seemed to mostly be about the potential future of CGI as art and its place in contemporary/future culture.

frik 9y ago

We are still not there. Press pause button on a CGI heavy movie like "2012". The effects work if they are in motion. But looking at them in "pause mode" on 1080p it looks like shit hits the fan. The same for Transformer movies. 90% is real world material with green screen background CGI effects. There are still way too many physical effects going on. And many directors went back to do more physical stunts, because the end CGI-only result was easily spotted and universally hated by the audience. Jurassic Park 1993 had only 18 minutes of dinosaur screen footage of - 95% of them were miniatures, costumes and hydraulic mechanical robots. Only a very short T-Rex running sequence was rendered with CGI with the predecessor of OpenGL rendered on Silicon Graphics hardware. The good thing is, even today the movie (shot in analog) can be viewed in 2k or even 4k. They will have to re-render "2012" and the Transformer movies for 4k and 8k in near future. Also the real time rendering is behind, video games still can't render 2005 era movie quality in real time, let alone 2017 era quality. So a bit pre-mature to call it "goodbye". The progress is great, but there is a road ahead for sure.

brador 9y ago

Only at a distance. Failure to extend research into vector textures over bit textures in the 80s now means 3D objects look blurred when close up. A big deal in VR and AR applications.

ttoinou 9y ago

I have yet to see a movie that tries to mimic what our eyes really see (with all the weird diffraction effect we have with our pupil and eyebrows, and some particles moving in the liquid in front of our eyes)

curiouslyme 9y ago

When I started watching the video, I thought "yep, this clip is a perfect example of uncanny valley" and kept waiting for them to switch to a clip that was actually photorealistic. Nope, turns out they seem to think the splash video is realistic. The whole video has tons of obvious flaws and overall feels wrong. I don't know if I have superman vision or what here...

samfriedman 9y ago

I was really blown away by one of the video clips this video uses [0]. It's a tech demo for a "zones" effect in VR. Really interesting effect that I could see being a lot of fun in a Sci-Fi game (wormhole travel). [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D-8kkH1KPE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D-8kkH1KPE

peterashford 9y ago

The author doesn't seem aware that "The Uncanny Valley" refers to the inability to make simulated humans appear natural, not making CGI in general look natural. Very annoying seeing someone use a term with a very specific meaning and not understanding it

robclewley 9y ago
I agree. The author's claim on the video that it's "common" now to use the term more widely is strange to me. I've never heard of it used in the more wide sense since the term became widespread, and I've worked in computer science research since the '90s. No citation given ...