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This seems like a really elaborate takedown of language ambiguity at best and an outright strawman at worst. The whole thing hinges on: > If the film 90 percen

This seems like a really elaborate takedown of language ambiguity at best and an outright strawman at worst. The whole thing hinges on: > If the film 90 percent practical special effects aka SFX, then that would suggest only about 10 percent were DVFX/CGI. But... is that true? If a real live stuntperson jumps from a real live car to another real live car, but a safety wire is digitally removed and mountains are added in the background, is that a practical effect or a digital one? The article insists it's a binary choice, and seems to say this should not be considered a practical effect at all. And the author's definition of digital effects really is that expansive: > The film’s color grading process entailed using DVFX to modify certain pre-existing recorded elements within the frame, such as the skies and background environments. Later in the article a bit of nuance appears: > What Jackson and the article make evident then is that Fury Road actually had a LOT of CGI quite literally on top of the practical SFX and stunt sequences, which were often enhanced, revised, transformed, augmented, supplanted, etc. through DVFX manipulation. Such changes were, for the most part, microscopic yet their scope was considerably larger than audiences were led to believe. There are some rhetorical devices that should raise flags, especially the odd "microscopic yet... considerably larger" construction. Ultimately, when I hear that "80 to 90 percent of the effects were practical", I take it to mean the cars were real and not CGI, the people swinging on poles were real and not CGI, etc. No complaints if the author wants to construct definitions that make those shots no longer "practical", but I don't think many people ever interpreted the claims to mean there was zero color grading or background replacement for continuity.

vile_wretch 2y ago
Any time someone talks about how films look better when sets and effects are practical someone chimes in to let them know how actually the horizon was composited or they added CGI sand in this sandstorm scene that would be extremely dangerous to film in if it were real. Just internet pedants who take everything way too literally.
- TheGRS 2y ago
  Bigger tendency of discourse to draw quick association lines instead of looking at the product holistically. A handful of bad video games released with poor micro-transactions, so micro-transactions leads to bad games. A lot of bad movies released with over-reliance on poor CGI, so CGI leads to bad movies. But in both of those cases I can see where the underlying methods could be a net positive for the product - if implemented well and with good intent. In the case of Fury Road, tons of great choices that are a net positive on the product. Including practical stunts and CGI and lots of artfully done color saturation. A lesser movie will try to ape everything Fury Road did just to make a quick buck on its success, but not really taking into account how the color saturation or the stunts enhanced parts of the story and theme. People with an opinion on a piece of work: judge it how it should be judged on the whole! These little shortcuts in discourse are boring and tiresome.
  - lupusreal 2y ago
    > micro-transactions leads to bad games. That claim is true. It was more than "a handful" of micro transaction games that are bad, it's virtually all of them. Micro-transactions, even if initially implemented with a "good intent" are intrinsically corrupting and any developer who implements them will get dollar signs in their eyes blinding them to taste, tact and good game design.
babypuncher 2y ago
Strictly speaking, your example qualifies as a VFX shot. However the line between practical and VFX/CGI can still feel very fuzzy. Top Gun Maverick was marketed as having filmed all the jet sequences "practically". And while it is true that nearly every shot of a jet started life as a shot of a real jet, the jets themselves were replaced with CGI in the final product. You couldn't tell, of course, because CGI has gotten very good, and the actual shot composition is still grounded in the reality of shooting with a physical camera looking at a real airplane. This approach happens a ton in the industry, where they film a "practical" effect, then replace it with CGI. The benefit to this is that you get an exceptional reference for the lighting and physics of the effect. When executed well, nobody can tell the difference. In Top Gun's case, they were able to shoot scenes with real fighter jets you can fly today, then replace those jets with whatever fictional or historical jet they really wanted for the scene.
aidenn0 2y ago
By your definition is a fully rotoscoped scene SFX or VFX? I.e. there were real people and real cars at some point, but they got fully painted over.
- brookst 2y ago
  Oh I have no idea. Taxonomies just lead to hair splitting. But I will say that if I saw a scene where a real person jumped a real car over a real canyon, no amount of rotoscoping would make me say that there were no practical effects.
legitster 2y ago
The author is trying to conflate CGI and VFX. But you can absolutely apply visual effects without computer generated imagery. The sound engineer has a lot of control over how a violin sounds in a recording. But it would be asinine to say that the violin becomes an electrical instrument as soon as it gets recorded, and all of the credit belongs to the sound engineer. But this is essentially the argument OP is making. Maybe to frame it another way, when George Miller said "90 percent of the movie doesn't have CGI", he's probably framing the total effort and manpower of the movie as an enterprise. It took a team of hundreds of people months to fabricate all of the vehicles, develop the stunts, film the thing etc - all in the Namibian desert. In comparison, it would be very easy to believe that the visual post processing could account for less than 10% of the total effort.

vile_wretch 2y ago

Any time someone talks about how films look better when sets and effects are practical someone chimes in to let them know how actually the horizon was composited or they added CGI sand in this sandstorm scene that would be extremely dangerous to film in if it were real. Just internet pedants who take everything way too literally.

TheGRS 2y ago
Bigger tendency of discourse to draw quick association lines instead of looking at the product holistically. A handful of bad video games released with poor micro-transactions, so micro-transactions leads to bad games. A lot of bad movies released with over-reliance on poor CGI, so CGI leads to bad movies. But in both of those cases I can see where the underlying methods could be a net positive for the product - if implemented well and with good intent. In the case of Fury Road, tons of great choices that are a net positive on the product. Including practical stunts and CGI and lots of artfully done color saturation. A lesser movie will try to ape everything Fury Road did just to make a quick buck on its success, but not really taking into account how the color saturation or the stunts enhanced parts of the story and theme. People with an opinion on a piece of work: judge it how it should be judged on the whole! These little shortcuts in discourse are boring and tiresome.
- lupusreal 2y ago
  > micro-transactions leads to bad games. That claim is true. It was more than "a handful" of micro transaction games that are bad, it's virtually all of them. Micro-transactions, even if initially implemented with a "good intent" are intrinsically corrupting and any developer who implements them will get dollar signs in their eyes blinding them to taste, tact and good game design.

babypuncher 2y ago

Strictly speaking, your example qualifies as a VFX shot. However the line between practical and VFX/CGI can still feel very fuzzy. Top Gun Maverick was marketed as having filmed all the jet sequences "practically". And while it is true that nearly every shot of a jet started life as a shot of a real jet, the jets themselves were replaced with CGI in the final product. You couldn't tell, of course, because CGI has gotten very good, and the actual shot composition is still grounded in the reality of shooting with a physical camera looking at a real airplane. This approach happens a ton in the industry, where they film a "practical" effect, then replace it with CGI. The benefit to this is that you get an exceptional reference for the lighting and physics of the effect. When executed well, nobody can tell the difference. In Top Gun's case, they were able to shoot scenes with real fighter jets you can fly today, then replace those jets with whatever fictional or historical jet they really wanted for the scene.

aidenn0 2y ago

By your definition is a fully rotoscoped scene SFX or VFX? I.e. there were real people and real cars at some point, but they got fully painted over.

brookst 2y ago
Oh I have no idea. Taxonomies just lead to hair splitting. But I will say that if I saw a scene where a real person jumped a real car over a real canyon, no amount of rotoscoping would make me say that there were no practical effects.

legitster 2y ago

The author is trying to conflate CGI and VFX. But you can absolutely apply visual effects without computer generated imagery. The sound engineer has a lot of control over how a violin sounds in a recording. But it would be asinine to say that the violin becomes an electrical instrument as soon as it gets recorded, and all of the credit belongs to the sound engineer. But this is essentially the argument OP is making. Maybe to frame it another way, when George Miller said "90 percent of the movie doesn't have CGI", he's probably framing the total effort and manpower of the movie as an enterprise. It took a team of hundreds of people months to fabricate all of the vehicles, develop the stunts, film the thing etc - all in the Namibian desert. In comparison, it would be very easy to believe that the visual post processing could account for less than 10% of the total effort.