I can't confirm but I believe that Robocop, and ET, were a few that used this method.
Also, I believe the idea for go motion originated with Star Wars a New Hope. During the landspeeder scene the filmakers smeared vaseline on the lens to create a "blurring" effect under the speeder...Later on they discovered that moving the object while the image was snapped could create more effective "blurring".
As for CGI, I also agree...It is very effective to a certain degree, but there's always something that gives away the illustion. I believe it may have something to do with the human eye being able to pick up on the fact that a CG character/object doesn't have any weight or mass.
I myself am a digital concept artist and have a few friends who are 3D digital artists....We're in the process of creating a new FX method which incorporates
CG and stop motion.
The big problem with go-motion is that it is VERY time consuming (more time consuming than stop motion), due to the fact that parts of the puppet need to be hooked up to a motion rod that move the sections by computer at the exact time the shutter on the camera is being snapped. What we're planning on doing is filming a stop motion character (which has weight and mass) and adding the blurring FX, (and reduction of jerkiness) with CG, instead of computer driven rods.
The CG will also be used for other smaller elements, like hair, sweat, muscle movement uder the skin, eye movements,facial movements, etc, BUT, the main model and filler of the character will be a modeled sculpture/puppet.
By fusing a real world puppet/model of a character, and smoothing over the smaller flaws with CGI I believe we can come up with something that might be as, or more effective, than most CGI seen today.
If these two elements can be combined successfully, (which takes care of the mass/weight, jerky motion, muscle and facial movement, hair problem), then we can move to the next step, which is realistic movements....which may involve a new kind of motion capture.
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AntoNEO
17 years ago
Wow! Thank you for such an exciting and enlightening post! Your project has me very excited, as does your field of work. The project you're working on falls exactly in line with what I want effects to be like, because I think CGI can be a great aid, it just shouldn't be solely depended on. Using CGI for the more minute elements (that would be much harder to do practically) as well as for smoothing things out sounds like a wonderful marriage of practical and digital effects. Didn't they use CGI to an extent to smooth out more recent stop motion films like Corpse Bride? I thought I heard that.
Regarding the weight/mass of CGI (or lack thereof), I completely agree with your theory. No matter how realistically an artist might be able to animate the illusion of mass, it still pales in comparison to the real thing. It also seems like texture is really hard to fabricate so that the human eye can't detect the difference.
It's interesting that you mentioned Robocop because I just watched that for the first time tonight (I know, I can't believe it took me so long), and when the pre-Robocop machine came out I was like "Cool! Stop motion!" However, I do in fact think it was just stop motion and not GO-motion, because it didn't compare to the smooth animation of the dragon in Dragonslayer. I'll have to check the Special Features to confirm this though.
I must say that I'm very interested in your research and would love to know more, either now or as the project progresses. Is it for a feature film or just for your own edification or...? Sorry, I'm just really intrigued!
"I grew up watching TV and I turned out TV." - Homer Simpson
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BioSlave
17 years ago
"Didn't they use CGI to an extent to smooth out more recent stop motion films like Corpse Bride? I thought I heard that."
Yes, I believe they might have...However, we're trying to take it just a bit further by experimenting with real world style creatures and characters (Instead of cartoony style), and tinkering with those tiny other elements I mentioned earlier.
"Regarding the weight/mass of CGI (or lack thereof), I completely agree with your theory."
Thanks...There are also a few other elements in CGI which give away the illusion that I can't get into right now (or risk writing a 10 page explanation)
"However, I do in fact think it was just stop motion and not GO-motion,"
Well, it was mostly Stop-motion, but they did use (according to some articles) a type of blurring effect, which would put it into a kind of "Go-motio" catagory..Rather than moving individual parts to get the bluring, they would shake or move the entire model...Less effective than Dragonslayer, but still the same basic principal.
"I must say that I'm very interested in your research and would love to know more, either now or as the project progresses. Is it for a feature film or just for your own edification or...?"
Actually, while I was working on Vid game project I got together with some of the other digital artists and we started discussing G0-motion...One thing led to another and stop-motion/CGI fusion popped into the conversation. One thing led to another and the Vid Game company gave us a small grant to research this possible technique.
We've had some good test footage done so far, one in particular, of a humanoid creature puppet with CG blurring and facial motions, turned out so realistic that we were almost in disbelief that it we actually did it with a fraction of the time it would take to do it in total CGI .
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AntoNEO
17 years ago
Wow, your test sounds like it was really exciting. I want to see! Hehe. The fact that it took less time and (I'm assuming) less money than a CGI creation would have taken is a very good sign too.
I was just watching Independence Day tonight on TV while channel surfing and I still think that movie has some great effects due to the use of models and what not for the spaceships. I feel like it was one of those last few movies that still used models rather than 100% CGI. Do you know why the changeover happened from models to CGI when it came to space stuff (such as ships, space stations, etc.) Heck, 2001: A Space Odyssey STILL looks incredible. Is CGI cheaper than model building or was it just a certain fascination with CGI due to its possibilities?
"I grew up watching TV and I turned out TV." - Homer Simpson
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BioSlave
17 years ago
Well, the first movie I remember seeing with CG ship/vehicles were Tron and The Last Starfighter. (Mid-aerly 80's)
Then for the next 10 or so years, it reverted back to models.
I don't think CGI is cheaper (Hundreds of CG artists need to work on these projects which involve labor pay, plus the vast number of hardware, and custom software written for specific FX needs to be taken into account), but CG is more practical and efficiant....
Yeah, I remember when Independence Day came out...They did a good job on the fighters themselves but the only problem was that the lens focus filter made them look like they were models. Watch the battle scene with all the fighters and you'll notice that they look really crisp and sharp...This, to me, makes them look underscaled.
As for modern films which still used miniatures, I know that for LOTR they insisted on using many minuatures (The city of Mini Tirith, Minio Morgul, etc.) for the sets. Also on King Kong, they used miniatures of the ship, and the ruins on the island and some of the landscape on the island (Many of the miniature plan life in the film had tiny springs attached to them so they would move like standard plants blowing in the breeze.).
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AntoNEO
17 years ago
Hm, interesting notes about Independence Day. I'll have to check it out again. So it sounds like you're saying it was actually too clear and gave away the scale of the models?
And while I haven't seen The Last Starfighter, the CGI in Tron was so simple (yet amazing for its time, I know) that it really would have only worked for that movie since it took place inside a videogame. Within that context, the simplicity worked (and still works) perfectly.
It's interesting that you mention Lord of the Rings, because that trilogy is my most recent example of effects done right (for the most part) in my opinion, because they're utilizing every art form, from "BIG"iatures to CGI to matte paintings to practical make-up effects. They use a marriage of everything to make the world come to life.
However, I do feel that in Return of the King and King Kong something went a little awry and everything started to seem a little more fabricated and "computery." I don't know if I can put my finger on what, but they didn't seem as seemless to me as the first two LOTRs. But I remember seeing a production diary on the minatures that you were talking about and making them spring in fast motion so that the high speed cameras would make them look like they were blowing in the wind. Cool stuff!
"I grew up watching TV and I turned out TV." - Homer Simpson
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AntoNEO
17 years ago
As a follow-up to the Robocop speculation, I just checked out the Special Features and there was no mention of GO-motion, only traditional stop motion "dynamation" (ala Harryhausen). Also, they even did a frame by frame breakdown of one of the stop motion scenes and every frame looked very clearly defined with no motion blur. So it sounds like it was done the old fashioned way. Dang, I want to see more GO-motion! Hehe. I look forward to speaking more with you about it though! :-)
"I grew up watching TV and I turned out TV." - Homer Simpson
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doctorcrimedog
17 years ago
The technique was developed during Empire Strikes Back for the Tautauns, though it wasn't perfected until Dragonslayer. The walkers in Return of the Jedi also used this technique, and are noticeably smoother than the walker scenes in Empire, which were purely stop-mo.
Jurassic Park was originally going to use Go-Motion for the full-body shots of the dinosaurs-in fact, Phil Tippet had already completed some of the animation for it-when the CG breakthrough hit courtesy of Dennis Muren, and the production changed in that direction. As much as I admire the work of Tippet and other animation artists, the CG dinosaurs did look better by comparison. This wasn't hurt by the fact that for that film at least, they actually made model dinosaurs that Tippet moved frame-by-frame in the traditional manner, and those moves were recorded by the model and inputted into the computer to create the animation.
I spent years of my childhood doing stop-motion films with my Star Wars figures, so I'll always have a soft spot for it, even if modern effects do mostly look better.
-There is no such word as "alot."
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