PurpleCheckered

Avatar’s effects was jaw-dropping. The compositing of what’s model and what’s real in both worlds, was just fantastic. The battle between the Avatar and the Humans was just endless use of digital effects and more compositing. It was insane, crazy effects job done. It was great.

However, I felt that the movie was really long and draggy, perhaps alot of the time was spend on exploring the Avatar world, which did not actually benefit the story well, though the environment was done well.

Overall, I felt it was a good movie to admire the effects and digitally created world. I did not really enjoy the story of the movie, perhaps the duration of the movie killed it.

Despicable Me was an utterly cute movie. The movie possesses alot of humor and wit. It was really entertaining with those yellow minion flooding the screen.

I like the exaggeration in this movie. Gru’s car, Gru’s very dangerous and not children friendly house, Vector’s apartment, the different weapon they both possess. It was exaggerated in a good way as it adds on to the plot and the humor of the movie as a whole. The most ‘normal’ thing about this movie have to be the 3 girls. They were the only 3 characters that were leading normal human lives that we can identify with, not like Gru’s and Vector’s goal in their lives, to be the world’s #1 supervillain.

I personally did not catch Toy Story 1 & 2 but that did not stop me from catching Toy Story 3. Toy Story 3 sure did bring back childhood memories for many. Though I’m not someone who spend alot of my childhood days playing with toys, I still feel for the pain of the toys who were thrown or put away.

Toy Story 3 change my views on animated movies. I used to think they are all childish and cartoonish, but Toy Story 3 prove me wrong. There was so much humor and it was action-packed, which was really fun to watch, though technically it’s just watching a bunch of toys moving around while their owners are busy.

Woody has 229 animation points of movement in his face. Buzz has 215 animation avatars in his face. The animation team for this movie must have been crazily busy, spend alot of time just animating the 2 main characters! The amount of blood and sweat put into this project keeping in mind that there were 302 characters!

Alice In Wonderland is a movie that was truely overwhelming for me. I haven’t heard of the Disney version of Alice In Wonderland, so to me, this was something very new to me. The movie started out a little boringly, but once Alice drop into the rabbit hole into Underland, it was like magic. The characters, the effects, the music, the modeling of the characters and the environment, they really sucked me into that rabbit hole with Alice.

Alice In Wonderland was mainly shoot in the green screen studios. I like the fact that there were both real human characters, such as Mad Hatter and Red Queen, and there were animated characters, such as Rabbit and the Cheshire Cat.

The character designs for this movie was amazing. Red Queen’s digitally enlarged head, Mad Hatter’s real crazy makeup from head to toe, Ilosovic Stayne’s digitally lengthened height!

Being a fan of twilight, I’ve definitely watched twilight, New Moon and the lastest, Eclipse. Probably this is one of the few visual effects films I would have watched. After doing some research on it, I found out that Image Engine actually played a great, significant, important role in the production of The Twilight Saga Eclipse. The production of Eclipse is summarized into “werewolf animation, digital doubles, vampire deaths, digital environments, matte painting and lots of compositing” as said by Visual Effects Executive Producer Shawn Walsh.

Nick Brooks, Production Visual Effects Supervisor credited Image Engine saying “Image Engine completed some of the hardest VFX work on Twilight Eclipse. Their 3D wolves are amongst the best in the film but represent just a portion of the stunning work that they created. Image Engine has found the balance between creative passion and technological excellence.”

Overall, I think Eclipse is fine, but I think there’s too much of a romance within the film. Oh, come to think of it. I was pretty shocked by this particular scene when I could see the green screen spillage on Edward’s and Bella’s face. It’s the scene when Edward and Bella were sitting on the grass patch surrounded with flowers. Perhaps I have high expectations for Twilight Saga even though I heard numerous negative comments. I expected it to be better and such “flaw” shouldn’t happen in film like this. But again, I’m still excited to wait for the next episode! Breaking Dawn! (:

Behind the Scene of Eclipse

I remember when Mr. Andrew told us he is showing us Terminator 2 this lesson, I asking about if it’s nice and all. To be frank, I’ve never heard of Terminator 2 and I’m totally clueless of what’s this movie all about. I wasn’t expecting much from this movie initially. But on the contrary, I enjoyed this movie to the fullest. The storyline, the effects, the sound effect and everything is just so awesome.

Terminator 2 involves a number of digital visual effects. For example, Robert Partrick’s T-1000 character is done using computer effects such as morphing and warping. Terminator 2 took morphing up to a whole new level. Morphing is a special effect that causes to change smoothly from one image to another by small gradual steps using computer-animated graphics. T-1000 changes from a computer generated form, “liquid metal” into a humanoid structure.

Basically, I would say Terminator 2 actually triggers my interest in visual effects movies. Terminator 2 is definitely an eye-opener for me. I like the part when terminator actually befriend with the little boy and how he actually assist him, protects him and saved him. And not forgetting the part when the boy actually taught terminator human language. AND! The way terminator turn, flip and swing the gun is soo cool! Fighting scenes between T-1000 and terminator are awesome! Thanks for showing this movie, Mr Andrew!

The second animated film that actually captured my attention fully, Coraline - a stop motion animation. Initially I thought it was just another boring film, but as i watched, I actually felt scared, at the same time engrossed. Personally, I don’t really like dolls or anything, and this film is about dolls. What triggers my fear most is the part when Coraline’s “fake” mum, a doll, actually asked Coraline to stay with them. But in order to do that, she has to sew the two buttons onto her eyes. This kind of send goose bumps down my spine. But afterall, I watched finish the whole film and I enjoyed it!

The backgrounds of the scenes are beautiful. Especially those in the “virtual” world, like the garden that the Buttons parents prepared for coralline.

Beside just enjoying the film and all, I thought I learnt something from this particular movie. That is, to be contented and happy with whatever you have at the present. No deny as humans, we’re always greedy and asking for more. But the more we get, we’ll be hungry for even more. And always having what we wanted may not be a good thing too. Because, we’ll never learn how to treasure, and might lead us to unforeseen situations.
Just like the tagline of Coraline, “be careful what you wish for “

One simple video to show part of the making of for Coraline:

Lastly, visit Coraline Movie website!

www.coraline.com

Check it out! it’s totally cool!

I have never been so interested and engrossed in an animated film until I chanced upon Spirited Away in Histmo lesson. Spirited Away is by Hayao Miyazaki, one of the greatest and most admired animators and directors in Japan. It is released in 2002 in Japan, and was adapted for an English speaking audience by Walt Disney Studios and Pixar Animation Studios in 2003.

The story line is simple but yet interesting. Strong-willed and courageous, this little girl, named Chihiro, embarked on an unforeseen adventure in order to rescue her parents. Even though it’s animation and not exactly “reality”, I’m amazed by the Chihiro’s character, and how determine she is to save her parents even at the cost of going through hard and torturous situations. Nevertheless, the presence of Haku is an aid to her, encouraging her, guiding her and giving her advices.

Spirited Away is built as simple as using storyboards, a set of simple drawings that helps plan the plot, and also showing camera shots and movements and everything that is included in the scenes. Animation films are built up one frame at a time. Characters are drawn on transparent sheets called cels. A separate background is made then each time a movement is created, a new cel drawing is filmed against the bg. Film usually runs at 25fps, meaning each drawing is shot for two frames, which also indicates each second of Spirited Away needs 12 drawings.

In one particular scene when Haku is a serpent and Chihiro tries to force open his mouth to feed him medicine, the animators wanted to make it look realistic. In order to bring it up to the standard, the animators actually visited a vet’s practice and video recorded the vet playfully putting her hand into a dog’s mouth.
Basically, I think the making of Spirited Away is amazing. It is realistic and nice. Every scene brings out the essence and flavour of the film. Good job to Miyazaki and everyone who helped in making this film! Love it! (: