Practical or CGI, which do you prefer


Nostromo-Cult's avatar
So there is this and two other questions I'd like to ask, those being do you like more new things or more tiebacks into the old (using old techniques and relying on nastlgia a bit) the second other thing, which I know should belong in one of the art forums, is do you prefer doing and looking at practical or digital, now I know that for the second question, people might say, a balance of both, but if you were to choose one, then what would it be?
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ProfessorMegaman's avatar
Practical.

In the horror movie genre, even bad practical effects can still look weird or creepy enough to compensate for the lack of technical sophistication.

But hybrid effects can be even more impressive if done right. Those of movies like Jurassic Park and The Lord of the Rings series still hold up in a way few films do.

I do resent it when CGI is obviously used as a cheap & easy substitute for practical effects, though.
Johninadelaide67's avatar
I have to say I am very fond of practical effects where possible.

I like nice model work on spaceships or vehicles if that can be done over the use of CGI.

I will probably be criticized but sometimes CG can be used too much.
believeinya's avatar
I dont really care either way, to be honest.

CGI on the level of Babylon 5 is a bit too primitive. It looked bad even when it was created.

But otherwise I mostly dont want the movie makers to blow stupid amounts of budget into effects and expect me to like the end result just because they spent so much money.

For example I would prefer it if Star Trek: Discovery had a much smaller budget and they would instead have done better work on the scripts and made it more accessible to the general public.
TheCunningCondor's avatar
We talking effects?

Both can be done right and wrong. You can tell when a movie is a CGI-fest but there are many films that do effects beautifully.
LizzyChrome's avatar
Depends.

I like CGI when done right; as an animation style, or as a special effect the audience isn't supposed to know is an effect.

I hate video-game CGI, with humans that look too realistic, and over-saturated sceneries and battles that literally give me a headache. I'm not exaggerating. I literally felt dizzy and my head hurt after "Revenge of the Sith," specifically because of all the over-saturated CGI.

I've always loved traditional animation, but as an adult I prefer when it has a style of some sort. I don't like bland animation except in so-bad-it's-good mockbuster movies that Phelous is reviewing. 
Nostromo-Cult's avatar
I fully agree, I saw a bit of Star Wars III like, yesterday, in fact, and I just couldn't look at anymore and so, I watched Rogue One instead. Those CGI faces in the spaceships at the start were terrible (if you know what I'm talking about)!
RolueVasReisa's avatar
Practical only.
CGI only if it can be done right.
Sci fi i guess can have some tiny bit of slack so long as it never starts looking really stupid cartoony. Mostly i think CGI has to be done right. The Planet of the Apes movie as a case in point example. They are some of my favorite movies ever and you'll notice quality time and care was put into the CGI.
CGI has to be done right. Very often it looks like a really dumb cartoon, such as when not enough time/ money is put into the CGI.

CGI is... extremely distracting so the CGI has to blend in perfectly. If it doesn't blend in and it feels like a big ugly cartoon in a super realistic live action movie, it's very distracting.

Also movie's dont need CGI.
Real stunts/ real effects/ real advancements in practical is a 100x more impressive than CGI. If you have to have CGI at least make it look good.

Some examples:

Mad Max Fury Road
the Chucky movies
The Fly
the original Alien
Stranger Things
IT (2017)
The Thing

These are movies that used as minimal CGI as possible. YES they did use CGI but they used as little of it as possible. I HUGELY respect this 100x more because it makes it feel more realistic. When your not using CGI, it feels more life like.
My final note on this is, if you have to use CGI then go the Avatar /Planet of the Apes route. Only use CGI if you can blend it in with real life. If you cant then it stands out and not in a good way.
Nostromo-Cult's avatar
I fully agree, especially with planet of the apes (war in particular) that movie had some stunning motion capture work on the apes. For stunts, I'm not sure if I would choose a stunt double or a stunt double with a cgi face attatched or having I fully cgi (especially if the actor is too old for stunt work. Two examples to a practical set I love is the observatory thing from The Dark Crystal and the wrecked airplane from a crash in War of the Worlds (which I saw in person at Universal Studios!)
RolueVasReisa's avatar
It's also because there are two kinds of CGI
There is motion capture CGI and vomit CGI. Motion capture is where you map onto a living person. THIS kind of CGI is 100x more realistic because it's literally mapped off of a real person. Some examples are: Gollum, Planet of the Apes movies, The Last of Us, Avatar. ALL of this is motion capture. CGI vomit shit is say Transformers and the Hobbit and Pirates of the Carribean. They don't put any attempt or effort into the CGI. They nkow they dont care. They don't respect their fans. They know they can vomit out any shit and their fans will just feed them money so they put zero effort into their cGI. Hence their CGI looks worse than 90s CGI and looks like complete utter shit. Less realistic than some video games.

Dark Crystal is an AMAZING practical effects movie. Although strange question.
Aren't they reviving that? Like seriously what in the hell happened? I thought they were reviving that? What happened? Is it still being revived

War of the Worlds is AMAZING CGI i actually really love the CGI in that movie seriously it is very good. The aliens are practical effects. The aliens were practical effects designed so the CGI is pretty minimal but very well done. Although that movie does have other problems like Dakota Fanning being an annoying screaming cunt and no i dont think Dakota is a terrible actress. She proved she is amazing in Coraline.
Nostromo-Cult's avatar
Yes, but but motion capture can also look like garbage (*cough, cough, Tarkin, Rogue One)
Yes, they are, it's caled The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
Here is the teaser trailer, or whatever it is:
m.youtube.com/watch?v=OGzVYyV_…
I'm pretty excited for it, actually.
RolueVasReisa's avatar
We must have been watching a different movie. I thought his CGI was really good. It didn't always look perfect but there was some moments i thought were really damn impressive with Tarkin...............
......
Ok imprsesive... slightly...
Is it Avatar or Jungle Book or Last of Us or Planet of the Apes? Well no. No shit

but you cant call it garbage. I mean calling it garbage i dont think you've ever seen the LOTR prequels or Hobbit prequels or Transformers films or Pirates of the Carribean films. No. There is some cringe worthy god awful garbage CGI and that wasnt one of them

i'm very excited for it but wondering when the hell is it coming out?? We haven't heard anything from it all year =\
Nostromo-Cult's avatar
Yep, I agree, I guess sometimes, for me it looks bad and some other days it looks alright.
I am also wondering when it will be coming out, aswell.
RolueVasReisa's avatar
Yeeeeeah i really want it to come out =( sad it hasnt come out yet. It should really give a clear signal that people want practical effects and it is in very high demand.
ToonEGuy's avatar
The sad thing about live-action movies relying so much on CGI nowadays is that it takes away from that old filmmaking magic and sense of wonder with the audience of "how did they do this?". There's really no mystery to it anymore with today's movies. Anyone can go to see a big-budget special effects movie and know that it's all done with computers. It's true that movies have always been about entertainment, but now more than ever it seems like that's the only reason we go to see them. Not to really be amazed anymore by how they're made or how something is achieved.
RolueVasReisa's avatar
Well it's why live action movies using practical effects, Sky rocket and are praised while CGI cartoon dumpster shit is ripped apart
"You have no proof!!!!!!!! -head spins like the exorcist- LIES!!!"

Oh except actually I do have proof
The Chucky franchise has lived and flourished with a cult following since the 90s. How are those ghost Paranormal Activity movies doing? Hm. Yeah that's what I thought

Mad Max Fury Road is one of the successful movies ever made

Star Wars the Force Awakens and Rouge One used more physical practical effects and actual physical models for everything they did
How were the prequels viewed? Oh that's right I remember -troll laugh-

Dumb CGI cartoon dumpster trash is trash that is having a very hard time dying. It doesn't want to accept how the world works. It is desperately trying to stay relevant and only keeps dying more and more

How was SJW Ghostbusters viewed? Oh that's right I remember -troll laugh-

This garbage hasn't died yet but it's dying fast

Hey how is the STD doing? Oh that's right it's dying fast while The Orville, a show using REAL LIVE practical effects and make up and costumes and scenery, is annihilating the competition

People like GOOD CGI
No one likes dumb shitty dumpster trash cartoon CGI that looks even worse than video games. It's pathetic and insulting when the graphics are worse than graphics we had in the 90s

I know for a fact that when I say this, I speak the true law of movies. Audiences want real practical effects. Not dumb cartoon for children shit. I won't defend myself because success speaks higher than words. If a critic is butt hurt hating a movie but it made one or two million dollars, that speaks higher than any level of critic butt hurt.
If a movie is praised by critics but makes little to no money in comparison to the cost made to make the film, that proves the movie was a failure

Audiences don't like dumb shitty CGI cartoon shit. They like CGI that is either GOOD or minimally used, again Good CGI does exist. Case in point Avatar and the Planet of the Apes movies. It's just sadly drowned in an endles abyss of terrible god awful CGI movies. Oh and if you want specific examples look at the Transformers franchise which is the living element of bad CGI and makes most of its money only through children and st that it's only just enough money to keep these movies alive. Transformers and Pirates of the Carribean are the two biggest icons of the BAD CGI movement.

Sorry if I'm talking too much
I seriously don't hate CGI. I like when it's done right in minimal but excellent use. However I prefer practical effects more. I will sooner watch The Thing or a Chucky movie or Mad Max Fury Road before watching a movie that's just CGI vomiting cartoons out every second ther don't look even remotely realistic
Mr-Timeshadow's avatar
I can see good arguments for both. I've seen practical so odd that they looked like CGI, and the reverse as well. There are seemingly ordinary shots in Contact that are actually CGI, such as when Jody Foster runs through a building early on. She slams a door open, and at that moment, the editor jumps from the real Very Large Array to a Hollywood set (they weren't allowed to film inside the real building's control room).
I got to see the "K" of KNB effects company at our college. He gave a live presentation about his career and how they make props. He also brought a bunch, like Jason's mask, a "mummified dog" from The X-Files, and some items from In the Mouth of Madness. I got to touch them -- gingerly -- and found that even at close range, they looked convincing. So: practical has that advantage. It also gives actors something to act against besides a tennis ball on a stick...
Masked-Guy's avatar
Practical, in example: say John Wick mostly used CGI for some blood splatter (there are bad scenes of "red clouds" - blood just splatters, it does not turn into poofy gas)
Vagabond-Ninja-Clan's avatar
Practical, because of some movies like Christine, they use pyrotechnics and film editing for some instances. One example is when Christine repairs herself, the film reverses to show the effect of the car fixes itself, but when the footage is played forward, the watcher can tell that there are hydraulic presses inside the car's plastic model. Second in the gas station explosion scene, the explosions are well-timed.
ToMaHaKeR's avatar
LOTR vs. Hobbit instantly comes to mind. You simply can't replicate some stuff (Nazgul vs. Trolls for example).
RolueVasReisa's avatar
The Hobbit is the exact example i'd use as a cautionary tale to any new directors. The Hobbit has some of the worst CGI ive ever seen in my life. To me it's like 90's Mortal Kombat movie's with how bad the CGI is. IT doesn't look even remotely realistic. It completely takes me out of the movie and feels like a cartoon in the middle of a live action fantasy epic.
and before anyone even tries to argue against me,

I dare you to argue that. I DARE YOU. They wanted to be as cartoony as possible because this is also the movie series that has an entire segment of fat man rolling down a hill in a barrel and the entire joke is hes fat get it?? Its humor on the level of Family Guy
oh and from this series you also got a joke about ram balls
These movie's were trying to be as cartoony as possible so it doesn't surprise me the CGI is cringe worthy bad but in my mind it sadly paints a negative light on the LOTR


IF i was going to give one bit of credit to the Hobbit, Smaug was AMAZING. Both acting, CGI, everything with him was spectacular but he should have been the only CGI in that entire series.
ToMaHaKeR's avatar
Yep, I forgot Smaug. He can pass. But I've heard somewhere that Dain Ironfoot in third movie was made entirely in CGI, I hope I'm wrong.
RolueVasReisa's avatar
No your right, everything in that movie was CGI XD it was just a giant CGI vomit shit fest.
Oh btw
You can have ENTIRELY CGI movies that look breath taking.
You want to knwo what that movie was called? JUNGLE BOOK. Jungle Book looked AMAZING seriously if u told me it was an entire CGI movie i wouldn't believe you. I'd think it was really actualyl filmed in the jungles of India. THAT is some insane godly good CGI. Oh you know whats even better is they used real life CGI mixed with really good CGI mixed with really bad CGI just to constantly throw you off balance so you never realized the entire thing was CGI.

The Hobbit movies, every single one, was a CGI dumpster fire. Not one real setting was ever used. They used the worst CGI ever because they knew they could. They knew fuck our fans, our fans are retarded brain dead children so we can make these movies as dumb as we want. The entire Hobbit series was about slapping the fans across the face left and right. It is the Star Wars prequels, It didnt give a shit about the fans and put the lowest level of acting possible

Why do the Elves and dwarves hate each other so much?
"Idk something about a rock idk i dont really care"
Thats not a real excuse you dumbass
Whats Angmar?
"Idk Sauron's anus? I dont really know"
Again that is wrong
What are the Nazgul?
"Some ghost reaper guys that come out of graves? Because reapers are like awesome now"
Christ did you even re watch your own fucking movies????


Peter Jackson and George Lucas both sold their souls to the CGI devils and their prequels suck major ass because of it
I hate George Lucas as much as i possibly can hate someone. However i will give him at least SOME redemption. He got heavily involved in Star Wars the Clone WArs. Thanks to him, we have some of the best plots Star Wars has ever seen so he at least tried to redeem himself but there is no redemption for JAckson and frankly i dont think he cares. I think he's a rich asshole that knows hes rich and can say fuck anyone. After all he's spent his entire career saying fuck you to corporate company's, wanting to be treated as god having everything pampered for him so it really doesn't surprise me the biggest asshole in the movie world, tried to fuck his best work.
Ghost-Soda's avatar
I can't decide, I like both practical and digital! :D
HCShannon's avatar
It depends on what it's being used for!