Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (USE SPOILER TAGS!)

[Kryptonic]

Originally Posted by chip75

Wow. That's pretty offensive to all the wonderful puppeteers that have created such magical performances in theatre and film for so many years. Puppets bring out the natural performances that tennis balls on a stick can never hope to emulate.

By the same token, those who bash CGI are being offensive to he hundreds of artists and animators it took to bring a character or sequence to life.

A puppet isn't real? If you can see it and touch it it's pretty real. Sure there are some limitations but the physical connection between the actor and the puppet far outweighs these.

*Sigh*

It's a film. It's not real. It's made up. That puppet isn't real anymore than a character in an animated film or a CGI character in a live action film. What's on the screen is what matters, not whether it was live on the set with an actor.

[klauswhereareyou]

As long as you've got a director interested in shooting things where they look good and fit in with the live action actors, I don't think it matters if it's physical or CGI.

[Lord Method Man]

Originally Posted by Kryptonic

It's a film. It's not real. It's made up. That puppet isn't real anymore than a character in an animated film or a CGI character in a live action film. What's on the screen is what matters, not whether it was live on the set with an actor.

It has screen presence. CGI does not.

[Kryptonic]

Originally Posted by Lord Method Man

It has screen presence. CGI does not.

It does not. It is a lifeless tool brought to life through a person "animating" it and giving it life, much in the same way that computer animators bring a lifeless CGI model to life through animation.

[Steelmaker]

Originally Posted by Kryptonic

By the same token, those who bash CGI are being offensive to he hundreds of artists and animators it took to bring a
character or sequence to life.



*Sigh*

It's a film. It's not real. It's made up. That puppet isn't real anymore than a character in an animated film or a CGI character in a live action film. What's on the screen is what matters, not whether it was live on the set with an actor.

I've said forever that "realism" is an overvalued commodity in film making. I think making things more CONVINCING is much more important than making things realistic. Here's an example of what I'm talking about...

I had read a story about when they were making The Muppet Movie. There was a little girl on set (apparently the daughter of one of the crew members) and they were getting ready to shoot a scene with Kermit The Frog. Before the filming began, the puppeteer was using Kermit to talk to the little girl. Well once filming began, the little girl from behind the camera pointed to Kermit and shouted "that's my friend!!"

Kryptonic, THAT'S what you cannot get and you will NEVER get with CGI. There is always going to be something inherently more convincing about filming a real, tangible character than filming a tennis ball on a stick in front of a green screen! We ALL know it's a puppet. We know it's not "realistic." But for example, Yoda as a puppet on Dagobah was absolutely convincing and believable, not only to the audience but more importantly to Mark Hamill who had to interact with him in those great scenes! Also because Frank Oz completely brought him to life!

It's kind of the same concept as watching a ventriloquist perform on stage. We all know the dummy isn't real. However if the ventriloquist is good at what he does, he manipulates the dummy and breaths life into him in such a convincing way that we as the audience allow ourselves to invest into that character and find it believable.

[camper]

Originally Posted by Kryptonic

It does not. It is a lifeless tool brought to life through a person "animating" it and giving it life, much in the same way that computer animators bring a lifeless CGI model to life through animation.

I'm not an actor, but I would imagine that looking at a puppet would be a lot easier than looking at a tennis ball with lines on it.

And I agree that CGI is huge work, and while I prefer puppets I think the ideal is puppets/animatronics/makeup enhanced with CGI. When something is ALL CGI it seems to blend a lot more than when most of the screen is 100% CGI. Especially with 'lifelike' critters.

[cricepng]

With CGI, actors too often can be seen trying but failing to look where the character is supposed to be. It takes me out of the movie a bit. With puppets the actor has a real something to interact with that will still be right there in the final shot.

[Astro Zombie]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

I've said forever that "realism" is an overvalued commodity in film making. I think making things more CONVINCING is much more important than making things realistic. Here's an example of what I'm talking about...

I had read a story about when they were making The Muppet Movie. There was a little girl on set (apparently the daughter of one of the crew members) and they were getting ready to shoot a scene with Kermit The Frog. Before the filming began, the puppeteer was using Kermit to talk to the little girl. Well once filming began, the little girl from behind the camera pointed to Kermit and shouted "that's my friend!!"

Kryptonic, THAT'S what you cannot get and you will NEVER get with CGI. There is always going to be something inherently more convincing about filming a real, tangible character than filming a tennis ball on a stick in front of a green screen! We ALL know it's a puppet. We know it's not "realistic." But for example, Yoda as a puppet on Dagobah was absolutely convincing and believable, not only to the audience but more importantly to Mark Hamill who had to interact with him in those great scenes! Also because Frank Oz completely brought him to life!

I agree with this. Having a puppet there with while filming is much better than CG because you can actually interact with it. CG can look good when done right I admit, but I've always preferred practical effects to computer generated effects. Neither one looks 100% real, true, but puppets always looks more convincing to me.

[Kryptonic]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

Yoda as a puppet on Dagobah was absolutely convincing and believable

This is laughable. The puppet is stiff and restricted in its performance and movement. It's not the least bit believable.

By the same token, at this point, most CGI characters are performed with mo-cap on set, so there's a pass done with someone, usually Andy Serkis, in a suit who's there for the actors to interact with.

Imagine James Cameron trying to film Avatar with puppets. Oh yeah, I'm sure that would just look fantastic.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by Kryptonic

Imagine James Cameron trying to film Avatar with puppets. Oh yeah, I'm sure that would just look fantastic.

Meh, it's a one-and-done either way.

[Lord Method Man]

Agreed. Yoda in Empire was a thousand times more lifelike than the lame CG recreation in the prequels.

[Steelmaker]

Originally Posted by Kryptonic

This is laughable. The puppet is stiff and restricted in its performance and movement. It's not the least bit believable.

By that logic you might as well say that NONE of Star Wars is believable. The star ships aren't believable, Darth Vader isn't believable, light sabers aren't believable, the Death Star isn't believable, etc. Again you're missing the point completely. We ALL know Yoda is a puppet. We all know he isn't a real living thing. However when I watched TESB not once was I thinking that. However when I look at a character like Watto or Sebulba, all I was thinking was "wow, look at that CGI character."

See this is why I think the original Jurassic Park still holds up very well to this day. Because Spielberg used a combination of both CGI and animatronics and the melding of both effect types made for a very convincing movie.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by Lord Method Man

Agreed. Yoda in Empire was a thousand times more lifelike than the lame CG recreation in the prequels.

It's not quite that cut and dried. Puppet Yoda was pretty clearly superior to CG Yoda in TPM but it gets murkier after that. The CG in Clones and Sith was awfully good and it allowed the character to do things that would have been hard to pull off with puppets.

[Astro Zombie]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

By that logic you might as well say that NONE of Star Wars is believable. The star ships aren't believable, Darth Vader isn't believable, light sabers aren't believable, the Death Star isn't believable, etc. Again you're missing the point completely. We ALL know Yoda is a puppet. We all know he isn't a real living thing. However when I watched TESB not once was I thinking that. However when I look at a character like Watto or Sebulba, all I was thinking was "wow, look at that CGI character."

See this is why I think the original Jurassic Park still holds up very well to this day. Because Spielberg used a combination of both CGI and animatronics and the melding of both effect types made for a very convincing movie.

This. Also, to use a more recent example, the first Iron Man film used a combination of CGI and animatronics making the suits more convincing.

[Steelmaker]

Originally Posted by octagon

It's not quite that cut and dried. Puppet Yoda was pretty clearly superior to CG Yoda in TPM but it gets murkier after that. The CG in Clones and Sith was awfully good and it allowed the character to do things that would have been hard to pull off with puppets.

This makes no sense to me. All 3 movies use the same CGI model. The CGI Yoda was added to The Phantom Menace after (or it may have been during) filming of Attack Of The Clones.

[Steelmaker]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0YNJuVbumM

[octagon]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

This makes no sense to me. All 3 movies use the same CGI model. The CGI Yoda was added to The Phantom Menace after (or it may have been during) filming of Attack Of The Clones.

I don't know what to tell you. Yoda seemed very off to me in TPM. It felt like (though obviously not to this degree) watching 70s newscasters in front of primitive greenscreen remote location backgrounds.

Maybe I was just more accustomed to it but by the time Sith rolled around it seemed far less distracting. In fact, I can't recall too many cases at all where the CG in Sith pulled me out of the movie in a bad way.

[klauswhereareyou]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the only film Yoda looked "real" in was Empire. I thought even in ROTJ he looked too puppety, and the less said about TPM original puppet Yoda the better. CGI Yoda looked like a colorform in AOTC, but looked better in ROTS, but still not as "real" as in Empire.

[cinemaphile]

Yoda looked fine in Empire and Jedi, and cg yoda looked fine in clones and sith. That TPM puppet however was simply awful.

[chip75]

Originally Posted by Kryptonic

It's a film. It's not real. It's made up. That puppet isn't real anymore than a character in an animated film or a CGI character in a live action film. What's on the screen is what matters, not whether it was live on the set with an actor.

Originally Posted by Kryptonic

This is laughable. The puppet is stiff and restricted in its performance and movement. It's not the least bit believable.

What nonsense. Mark Hammil is on record as saying how he just got lost in the moment during his Dagobah scenes, that in the end it was just him and Yoda on an incredible set with incredible atmosphere. Every body's game was raised due to the physical existence of the props, animals and puppets.