Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens VFX Breakdown Reel - General

[sp]I like how they had a piece of green screen fly onto the cockpit for reference for the Rathar, probably for the actors to look at and to track[/sp] [editline]14th January 2016[/editline] When one of the X-wings is locked on by a Missile it sounds like the SFX from the old flight sim games. though that sound might have been from the original movies.

I love that they used flair l glowing prop sabers for the lightsaber fights, easier to track and gives a real glow on the actors without having to edit it in later

tbh I really wish Maz was more of a humanoid alien like a twi'lek or something since she's a more important character they wanted her to have proper facial expression and all that but due to her design, she has to be computer generated. And while she does look pretty good, she only really looks good for a video game, she's clearly cgi and it definitely won't hold up. If they just gave her a design that's easily achievable with make-up, then they wouldn't have to realistically animate something that's obviously on a separate plane from all the other characters.

[QUOTE=cdr248;49532130]tbh I really wish Maz was more of a humanoid alien like a twi'lek or something since she's a more important character they wanted her to have proper facial expression and all that but due to her design, she has to be computer generated. And while she does look pretty good, she only really looks good for a video game, she's clearly cgi and it definitely won't hold up. If they just gave her a design that's easily achievable with make-up, then they wouldn't have to realistically animate something that's obviously on a separate plane from all the other characters.[/QUOTE] I think her biggest problem was too much subsurface scattering, which is how the light hitting skin tends to glow through a bit. Maybe just being solid orange made it tougher to work with, but it felt like her skin was a thick layer of gummy worm stuff, rather than skin with meat and bone behind it.

I don't get this singling out of Maz and how often it's bitched about. I mean sure she looks a bit out of place, but she looks miles better than say, Yoda did in Episode 5, you could tell he was a little puppet the second you saw him. [editline]14th January 2016[/editline] Like it just seems that people are way more prone to criticizing even slightly poorly done CGI than they are of criticizing bad practical effects.

[QUOTE=cdr248;49532130]tbh I really wish Maz was more of a humanoid alien like a twi'lek or something[/QUOTE] Man, that makes me think of how awesome Maz would be as a Twi'lek.

[video=youtube;buyflmtHcHc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buyflmtHcHc[/video] look at this fake as shit pear. what the fuck were they thinking. she literally just eats the air with no resistance. [B]who the fuck eats a fruit with a fork and knife?[/B]

[QUOTE=Rebi;49532489]you could tell he was a little puppet the second you saw him.[/QUOTE]i couldn't because i was 6

[QUOTE=codemaster85;49532596][video=youtube;buyflmtHcHc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buyflmtHcHc[/video] look at this fake as shit pear. what the fuck were they thinking. she literally just eats the air with no resistance. [B]who the fuck eats a fruit with a fork and knife?[/B][/QUOTE] You can at least take solace in the fact that yes, that is an actual set. Just not the pear. Because why give the actors something to actually work with. [QUOTE=Rebi;49532489]I don't get this singling out of Maz and how often it's bitched about. I mean sure she looks a bit out of place, but she looks miles better than say, Yoda did in Episode 5, you could tell he was a little puppet the second you saw him. [editline]14th January 2016[/editline] Like it just seems that people are way more prone to criticizing even slightly poorly done CGI than they are of criticizing bad practical effects.[/QUOTE] People bring up Yoda, and they have a point. Yoda succeeds as a puppet because the actors, and writing help sell him and his character so you're able to just sorta brush off the fakeness of his puppet and get immersed in the story and the characters. Like, Mark Hamill's performance is what [I]truly[/I] made Yoda come alive. That entire sequence really rode on Mark Hamill being able to effectively sell the audience a little green puppet as a wise master of the force. In The Phantom Menace they used a Yoda Puppet, but because those aspects weren't there the character did not come across as life-like or believable in any way.

Yoda suddenly being able to do sick flips and shit was the most ridiculous thing. I wish they just made him a strict force-use Jedi instead of having that ridiculous fight sequence with Palpatine

[QUOTE=Glitchman;49529417]I've never used Nuke, looks like a whole dedicated program for compositing! I'll have to try it out. I've been using After Effects forever[/QUOTE] Meanwhile I'm starting to use After Effects now. Played around with 3ds Max earlier.

[QUOTE=Glitchman;49529177]You never HAVE to use CGI, what? how do you think they made movies before the 90's[/QUOTE] [i]Have[/i] to? No. But sometimes it is better to use CGI instead of, say, a puppet... [img]https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--EOeL13mv--/c_fill,fl_progressive,g_north,h_358,q_80,w_636/18lqbc4zoncepjpg.jpg[/img]

They need to release a full version of the film using the raw footage and PS2 graphics for the CGI shots. I want to see more invisible Millennium Falcon and guy-in-a-green-suit.

[QUOTE=smurfy;49533450]They need to release a full version of the film using the original untouched footage and PS2-tier CGI shots. I want to see more invisible Millennium Falcon and guy-in-a-green-suit.[/QUOTE] Seeing the PS2-esque dogfight scenes in this reel made me realize how badly I want a new Star Wars flying game. Could you imagine seeing something like [i]Rogue Squadron IV: Black Leader?[/i] (also I just really love how Poe's designation is Black Leader because he leads both Red and Blue Squadrons)

[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;49527021]What bothered me was Kylo Ren's mask being CG It seemed really unnecessary[/QUOTE] I think it was just that one shot. They looked at the shot in post and decided they liked it better with the mask, so they didn't want to have to get adam driver and the whole crew back on set, so instead they just CGI'd it. Could be wrong tho.

[QUOTE=Funktastic Dog;49533470]I think it was just that one shot. They looked at the shot in post and decided they liked it better with the mask, so they didn't want to have to get adam driver and the whole crew back on set, so instead they just CGI'd it. Could be wrong tho.[/QUOTE] I think it was also before the first shot of him taking his helmet off (that we see in the final cut), so they didn't want to spoil how weak he really looked under the mask before the big reveal with Rey.

[QUOTE=codemaster85;49532596][video=youtube;buyflmtHcHc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buyflmtHcHc[/video] look at this fake as shit pear. what the fuck were they thinking. she literally just eats the air with no resistance. [B]who the fuck eats a fruit with a fork and knife?[/B][/QUOTE] Lol, especially when levitating a small object is one of the simplest effects to do with practical effects. Seriously, they could've just used a fishing line and it wouldve looked better.

[QUOTE=codemaster85;49532596][video=youtube;buyflmtHcHc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buyflmtHcHc[/video] look at this fake as shit pear. what the fuck were they thinking. she literally just eats the air with no resistance. [B]who the fuck eats a fruit with a fork and knife?[/B][/QUOTE] I love the grin she does right after he steals her pear. [I]I'm smiling on the outside, but that was my pear you little shit.[/I]

[video=youtube;oR3mTfnCh8Q]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR3mTfnCh8Q[/video] The unfinished CG kinda looks like the cutscenes in dark forces 2

Where's my Dogme 95 Starwars!

[QUOTE=Rebi;49532489]I don't get this singling out of Maz and how often it's bitched about. I mean sure she looks a bit out of place, but she looks miles better than say, Yoda did in Episode 5, you could tell he was a little puppet the second you saw him. [editline]14th January 2016[/editline] Like it just seems that people are way more prone to criticizing even slightly poorly done CGI than they are of criticizing bad practical effects.[/QUOTE] maz as a puppet would be shit too imo, that's why I think they should've replaced her with a real actor.

I still prefer original puppet Yoda to CGI Yoda. Not only in looks, but also the personality, I still have no idea why they made prequel-Yoda boring as fuck compared to the cheeky, witty and funny OT-Yoda. Also agree on Maz, would be awesome as Twi-Lek. Twi-Leks are so well designed but unfortunately heavily underused.

[QUOTE=Flicky;49533465]Seeing the PS2-esque dogfight scenes in this reel made me realize how badly I want a new Star Wars flying game. Could you imagine seeing something like [i]Rogue Squadron IV: Black Leader?[/i] (also I just really love how Poe's designation is Black Leader because he leads both Red and Blue Squadrons)[/QUOTE] it's a good thing too because Purple Leader sounds damn silly.

[QUOTE=Drewsko;49526791]For all the "practical" talk in the promotion, certainly seems CGI enhancement was still in plentiful use for a lot of these shots (from the rumors I heard, I was thinking they had managed shots of the spaceships with models in the same way the OT did.) Though considering this is a reel dedicated to VFX in particular, maybe I'm just looking at too narrow a focus. If anything though, this shows how well CGI has improved sinced 1999-2005. If it's not a creature we can compare to the uncanny valley scale, it's pretty darn hard to tell what's real or not. And even then, the creatures aren't far off either, Maz was really darn real-looking in this one.[/QUOTE] I think the most evident of this is when on Jakku the camera focuses on a sheer drop and the Falcon flies evasively with a pursing tie fighter.. that shit looked cash as fuck. Much with my initial post about TFA --- and I've seen it 4 times now --- the movie seems [I]real.[/I] The locations, vehicles, people, situations and weapons were all real.

[QUOTE=Bradyns;49549921]I think the most evident of this is when on Jakku the camera focuses on a sheer drop and the Falcon flies evasively with a pursing tie fighter.. that shit looked cash as fuck. Much with my initial post about TFA --- and I've seen it 4 times now --- the movie seems [I]real.[/I] The locations, vehicles, people, situations and weapons were all real.[/QUOTE] It's true, [I]all of it[/I].

Aaand it's down. Surprised it lasted this long.

The 2nd link went down 2-3 days after.

[QUOTE=Treznor;49543932]I still prefer original puppet Yoda to CGI Yoda. Not only in looks, but also the personality, I still have no idea why they made prequel-Yoda boring as fuck compared to the cheeky, witty and funny OT-Yoda. Also agree on Maz, would be awesome as Twi-Lek. Twi-Leks are so well designed but unfortunately heavily underused.[/QUOTE] Well, I always thought that Yoda took himself seriously, but like Obi-Wan, he didn't want Luke to know about the tragic destruction of the Jedi Order (would you want to redeem your dad if you found out he killed all of your mentor's friends, including single-handedly murdering every Jedi child in training, and destroying the main hope for peace in the galaxy?). Plus, he'd also been all alone for decades. I always thought that the isolation and approaching his death had just driven him slightly senile.

[QUOTE=KillerJaguar;49527021]What bothered me was Kylo Ren's mask being CG It seemed really unnecessary[/QUOTE] Could have been a continuity fuckup, or runoff from a deleted scene that needed to change for context. It's probably the latter. Shit like this is usually the latter. One of my old 3d teachers was talking about a ton of changes like this they had to do in Cats & Dogs because the movie had to be cut down a shitload for time. [editline]20th January 2016[/editline] [QUOTE=cdr248;49543454]maz as a puppet would be shit too imo, that's why I think they should've replaced her with a real actor.[/QUOTE] Nah, I think her character design and performance was too good to be compromised for the sake of having an actor in a suit.

[QUOTE=xalener;49572790]Could have been a continuity fuckup, or runoff from a deleted scene that needed to change for context. It's probably the latter. Shit like this is usually the latter. One of my old 3d teachers was talking about a ton of changes like this they had to do in Cats & Dogs because the movie had to be cut down a shitload for time.[/QUOTE] It was pretty much this. The scene was originally planned to show up after his face reveal. But they decided it was better placed before it, so they moved it and CGI'd the helmet on his head, as opposed to in his hand like it was originally.