The director announces they only get one take, it’s the most expensive shot of the film and they’re using real acid – cue inevitable disaster. This was made in the 90s today The Simpsons may have thought the director would use CGI instead. SFX is broadly split into two groups – practical effects – mechanical/physical effects, things that really exist, the other use post-production techniques like CGI. Once all SFX were practical effects but over the decades CGI has become far more prevalent.

Christopher Nolan is a great filmmaker in many ways and one of the ways he stands out from his contemporaries is that he still relies on practical effects a lot of the time. One of Nolan’s most famous uses of practical effects is in the film Inception, notably “The Hallway Fight”. Not to get too into the details but two characters are fighting over a gun while the hotel they are in is spinning round, the characters are tossed around as the hotel flips. One character utilises this quite effectively, adjusting his movements to better keep his balance, walking on the floor, then the wall, then the ceiling. This brilliant scene is done with practical effects. Nolan created the corridor set, then built a cylinder around it and a frame that could rotate the corridor. Essentially, the corridor is indeed being flipped over, it is not a camera trick.

Nolan will often just destroy things rather than use CGI. In Tenet that is a real plane that is destroyed and in The Dark Knight a real lorry that he flips over. Obviously doing such things is expensive and dangerous and possibly can only be done once – film studios are not made of airplanes for Nolan to destroy. Apparently in Nolan’s new film, Oppenheimer, a scene depicting the blast of an atomic bomb was made using practical effects and not CGI.

Mad Max: Fury Road is another great example of practical effects. CGI is used, for example in the dust storm, but if something could be done in reality, it was. At least 75 cars were destroyed in the making of the film. MM:FR does bring up a brilliant use of CGI alongside practical effects – it removed things like seatbelts and other safety features, digitally erasing these things that kept actors safe yet would not be present in a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

The benefits of practical effects are real – first and foremost, so often the audience can tell. The lorry flip in The Dark Knight felt real, whereas many people have commented on the “weightlessness” of CGI battles that never fully convey the impact of what is supposed to be happening. Often practical effects help actors – having seen behind the scene footage of sci-fi blockbusters where an actor is simply on a green screen stage having “real” items can help their performance.

There are some things that CGI is better suited for. First and foremost, it is usually cheaper. Cult sci-fi film Monsters used CGI to create many of it’s effects (as well as just finding weird real-life places to shoot) and was largely done by the director on his home computer. The fact that small filmmakers can create scenes that could cost millions is great for cinema. Next is that there are simply some things that can’t be done with practical effects, or would look so obviously unrealistic as to defeat the purpose. The recent version of The Jungle Book by Disney was created almost entirely with digital effects, with the actor playing Mowgli essentially being the only real thing on screen – and the thing is correct as it wasn’t just the talking animals that were created but every single tree, rock and blade of grass. Now the thing is – talking animals aren’t real, and doing it with practical effects – puppets and animatronics probably wouldn’t look as real. There is also a great deal of flexibility with using CGI – say Nolan changed his mind and didn’t want to flip a lorry but a bus instead. Nolan would have to redo the entire scene, using CGI it would be far easier.

Practical effects still very much have a place in cinema and ideally a clever combination of all available techniques is likely to give the best results, rather than rigidly sticking to one method. While Nolan used practical effects in Inception there is also a lot of CGI, directors can pick the right tool for the job.

Also Read: The Anatomy of a Christopher Nolan Film

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Today we will briefly look at the key live-action films that pushed CGI integration forward. Then we will look at how these effects are incorporated into films. Before finally discussing what the rise of CGI has meant for the industry and audiences.

A Brief History

While films using CG images date back quite far (Vertigo’s opening (1958), A Computer Animated Hand (1972), etc.), 1973’s Westworld was the first live-action feature to use CGI within the narrative.

Live-action films made further strides in CGI incorporation throughout the 20th century. Star Wars (1977) featured wireframe computer animation. Tron (1982) put real actors into a CG world for the first time. Young Sherlock Holmes (1985) is widely considered to be the first live-action film to feature a computer-generated character. The Abyss (1989) and Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991) helped to perfect CG liquid textures. And Jurassic Park (1993) blended CGI with practical effects to create realistically textured, moving dinosaurs.

The 2000s, thanks to widening software availability and increasing computer speeds, saw films using much more CGI. Several CGI-intensive franchises like Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings (which revolutionised motion capture) debuted. Smaller projects, like District 9 (2009), also used it to realise its alien people and technology. But Avatar (2009) redefined what CGI was capable of. Featuring a vast computer-generated world that blended real actors and effects seamlessly it became the highest-grossing film of all time. Paving the way for other huge effects blockbusters like the MCU.

How CGI Becomes Part Of A Film?

With CGI’s capabilities making huge strides, how do film productions go about integrating the effects? CG elements are mostly created separately alongside filming and are combined with the filmed elements during post-production. Green screens, chroma key suits, motion capture suits, placeholders etc. provide guidelines during production for effects artists and actors as to where the CG elements will go. However, CGI is not just separate work utilised in post-production.

CG pre-visualisation has started to gain prominence. This is where CGI is used to visualise part of a movie prior to production. It gives camera operators, directors etc. an idea of what the film will look like. Allowing them to plan and experiment with how something will be shot.

Advancements now also allow CGI to be visible and filmable during film production. For example, LED Volume and the Unreal Engine have been used to create and visualise realistic CG background elements which can be filmed and edited during planning and production. This technology, which displays CG environments through vast background screens, was recently used during the filming of the short Fireworks and The Mandalorian season 3. Although the technology has some workload and implementation issues this advancement allows workers to create intricate, detailed CG backgrounds. While actors are given more definitive visual aids to perform against. Helping make the drama more believable to audiences.

How CGI Has Changed The Industry?

CGI has completely transformed the movie experience. It has allowed audiences to see incredible creations and has been the basis for many beloved movies. However, with some recent films having a majority of their shots containing visual effects like CGI and many recent articles addressing how bad CGI can negatively affect audience experience, CGI advancement clearly does not automatically produce good art.

CGI is a tool and many factors influence its effectiveness. If VFX artists are not given enough time to complete their work the quality suffers. The oversaturation of effects-heavy blockbusters has also accustomed audiences to a certain level of quality, making subpar CG more noticeable. And if films fail to ground their effects or engage viewers narratively or emotionally the effects can lose their impact. 

These represent the main issues for CGI moving forward. If the industry wants to maintain audience interest in an age of CG oversaturation it must consider these points and not just focus on advancement for its own sake. As George Lucas said, a special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing.

Also Read: A.I Generated Art & Movies: A Collision Course

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But it’s not actually going to be him though, is it? It might look like him and maybe even sound a bit like him, but it’s not going to BE him on set. Actors die during productions and need stand-ins for workarounds sometimes, but this is being billed as his fourth role. The press release mentions his family approve of the “casting” but others in the industry have been less kind. Can it work?

“Dream as if you’ll live forever. Live as if you’ll die today”– James Dean

Unfortunately, cast and crew passing away mid-production is nothing new. When a key character dies, it can often add extra complications to a film as they may not have finished all their scenes. If most of their scenes were complete, a few rewrites and additional lines from other characters could suffice, others require more creative approaches. If their scenes were not very far along or it was a small role, they may simply be recast.

As technology and visual effects have advanced, the options available to filmmakers in this potion has grown. Recently de-ageing has become popular with films such as “Captain Marvel” and “The Irishman” allowing actors to play roles across decades. This allows them to look age-appropriate in flashbacks.

“If a man can bridge the gap between life and death, if he can live on after he’s dead, then maybe he was a great man” – James Dean

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story infamously featured Peter Cushing, reprising his role as Tarkin from the original film. This process involved having an actor on set (Guy Henry) and then digitally compositing Peter Cushing’s face. It’s a similar process to deepfakes. But it’s the original actor’s choices that made the character what it is. A computer is just trying to recreate it.

Dean died in 1955, long before this idea of CG “resurrection” had ever been conceived, and as such his likeness is not protected from usage after his death. Robin Willaims restricted usage of his likeness for 25 years after his death. This practice could become more common as technology evolves. Worldwide XR, the company who owns the rights to Dean’s likeness, also owns several other deceased famous faces. This list includes Malcolm X, Bette Davis, Ingrid Bergman and Rosa Parks. So does this mean we’ll start seeing them in films too? Well, nothing is stopping them.

“To me, acting is the most logical way for people’s neuroses to manifest themselves, in this great need we all have to express ourselves” – James Dean

Obviously, the whole idea of an actors face being used years after their death is a serious debate that’s only going to get louder as time goes by. But one aspect worth considering is the effect on actors currently working. It’s hard enough to have a successful acting career, but they have to worry about competing with dead ones too?

Taking this into science fiction territory, could we see films without traditional actors at all? Animation only requires actors for voices, but this technology must allow for voices to be synthesised. Could we see Orson Welles voice the villain in the next Toy Story? Could Dean win an Oscar for his role? The rules are always changing, so it wouldn’t be unheard of.

Another consideration is the rise of holograms. Recently technology has allowed musicians like Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison and Amy Winehouse to tour and perform “live” at concerts. If we can have people perform at a concert, and have them appear in a new film, could we get them to promote it too? Could a hologram appear on a talk show?

“Being an actor is the loneliest thing in the world. You are all alone with your concentration and imagination, and that’s all you have” – James Dean

This is all speculation, of course, a lot can go wrong between a film being announced and it being released. Dean’s “performance” could just be a marketing ploy (despite the director’s claims). But if it does work, this “necromacting” could be just the beginning.

Also Read: Your Favourite Movies Deepfaked

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