"stbenge" <UN### [at] hotmailcom> wrote in message news:4b970bcd@news.povray.org...
> Jeremy "UncleHoot" Praay wrote:
>> I recently watched "Coraline" (again) on Blu-ray.  For some reason, I 
>> really enjoy this movie.
>
> I liked it a lot, too. The whole idea is great, in a Twilight Zone sort of 
> way. That part with the two old ladies singing and dancing in the theater 
> was just too much! It was at that point I realized that the movie might 
> not be entirely suitable for children ;)

Oddly enough, I was actually glad that someone was bold enough to put 
something like that into a "kids" film.  My daughter (11 yrs) got quite 
embarrassed, which was probably worth the price of admission for me. 
Perhaps I'm a little sadistic.

I say "kids" (in quotes), because I don't think it's for everyone.  I 
imagine that some parents were probably shocked and generally pissed-off 
after taking their kids to see that movie.  I tend to be quite liberal in 
that regard, so for me it was a breath of fresh air.  Having taken my 
daughter to a lot of kids/family films over the years, this was the first 
one that really inspired me.  I would agree that it's perhaps the equivalent 
of "Children's Horror", if there is such a genre.

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"Jeremy \"UncleHoot\" Praay" <jer### [at] questsoftwarecmo> wrote:
> [..]  Because it's stop-motion, rather than CG [...]

Are you sure about that? I'm pretty sure it is CG but made to look like stop
motion for artistic reasons.

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Roman Reiner wrote:
> "Jeremy \"UncleHoot\" Praay" <jer### [at] questsoftwarecmo> wrote:
>> [..]  Because it's stop-motion, rather than CG [...]
> 
> Are you sure about that? I'm pretty sure it is CG but made to look like stop
> motion for artistic reasons.

Nope, it was good ol' stop motion:

http://www.larissameek.com/2009/02/07/the-making-of-coraline/


With this and The Fantastic Mr. Fox it was a really good year for 
stop-motion movies.

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Kevin Wampler <wam### [at] uwashingtonedu> wrote:
> Roman Reiner wrote:
> > "Jeremy \"UncleHoot\" Praay" <jer### [at] questsoftwarecmo> wrote:
> >> [..]  Because it's stop-motion, rather than CG [...]
> > 
> > Are you sure about that? I'm pretty sure it is CG but made to look like stop
> > motion for artistic reasons.

> Nope, it was good ol' stop motion:

  One sad thing about computer graphics is that people are dismissing other
great forms of art as "just CGI".

  CGI is great when well done, and absolutely stunning things can be
achieved with it (for example, I don't think the LotR trilogy would have
been physically possible in its current form without CGI).

  However, it's sad when other great pieces of work are deemed as "just CGI"
when in fact they aren't, so people will miss all the work which went into
making them by other means.

  An interesting question is, however: If a stop-motion movie is mistaken
for a CGI movie, is it an insult or a compliment?

  (Similarly one could ask if an animatronic puppet being confused for CGI
is an insult or a compliment...)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Kevin Wampler escreveu:
> Roman Reiner wrote:
>> "Jeremy \"UncleHoot\" Praay" <jer### [at] questsoftwarecmo> wrote:
>>> [..]  Because it's stop-motion, rather than CG [...]
>>
>> Are you sure about that? I'm pretty sure it is CG but made to look 
>> like stop
>> motion for artistic reasons.
> 
> Nope, it was good ol' stop motion:
> 
> http://www.larissameek.com/2009/02/07/the-making-of-coraline/

BTW, the wikipedia entry says 3D models and facial expressions were 
printed with a 3D printer and used in Coraline.  So, aside from 
rendering, there's CG in there. ;)

-- 
a game sig: http://tinyurl.com/d3rxz9

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nemesis <nam### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> BTW, the wikipedia entry says 3D models and facial expressions were 
> printed with a 3D printer and used in Coraline.  So, aside from 
> rendering, there's CG in there. ;)

  I wouldn't say CG per se. Maybe CAD?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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"Jeremy \"UncleHoot\" Praay" <jer### [at] questsoftwarecmo> wrote:
> I recently watched "Coraline" (again) on Blu-ray.  For some reason, I really 
> enjoy this movie.  I wouldn't exactly refer to it as a children's film.  In 
> fact, it's exactly the type of film that is almost certain to breed 
> nightmares in young children.

  "Stop motion puppets, fairy tale, protagonist is an 11yo girl... Bah, a
children's movie.... What do you mean? It's not for kids?"

  The producers really took a huge risk with this movie. It has everything
that people are prejudiced against: It's basically a fairy tale (kids stuff),
animated (kids stuff) and stop motion at that (even more kids stuff).
And producing a high-quality full length stop motion movie is quite
expensive.

  But the film is quite good, actually. I had been eyeing this movie on the
rental for quite some time, as I had heard good things about it, but never
got around to actually renting it. However, this thread finally gave me the
push I needed. I don't regret it.

  It's actually refreshing to see a movie made differently than the usual
CGI movies. I can appreciate the huge amount of work that had to be put
into this. Some of my favorite trivia:

"For the character of Coraline, there were 28 different puppets of varying
sizes; the main Coraline puppet stands 9.5 inches high."

"To construct 1 puppet of Coraline, 10 individuals had to work 3-4 months."

"There were at total of 207,336 possible face combinations for the character."

"One crew member was hired specifically to knit miniature sweaters and
other clothing for the puppet characters, using knitting needles as thin as
human hair."

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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From: "Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>
Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 5:52 PM
Newsgroups: povray.off-topic
Subject: Re: Coraline (mini-review)

> nemesis <nam### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
>> BTW, the wikipedia entry says 3D models and facial expressions were
>> printed with a 3D printer and used in Coraline.  So, aside from
>> rendering, there's CG in there. ;)
>
>  I wouldn't say CG per se. Maybe CAD?
>

Can't remember where I read it, but it's stop-motion and CG.  I guess I'd 
have to watch it again and try to pick out the CG.  The article specifically 
mentions the fact that they wanted to blend old and new.

2D animation generally contains "CG" to some extent now as well.  Some 
things are just easier if there is a computer involved.  But then, we all 
know that here...  ;-)

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> "To construct 1 puppet of Coraline, 10 individuals had to work 3-4 
> months."

Slackers.

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UncleHoot <jer### [at] mutualdatacom> wrote:
> Can't remember where I read it, but it's stop-motion and CG.

  Well, CG in a way.

  The dolls had a horizontal line at eye level (because the lower and upper
halves of the face were separate and changeable). The line was removed in
post-production using computer image manipulation. You *could* argue that's
"CG". However, when one speaks about "a CG movie" it means that the contents
were generated with CG, rather than something removed or filtered. That's
rather normal post-production, even if it's done with a computer.

  (It's the same as when in a live action movie something like safety wires
being removed in post-production using a computer. While a computer is
involved, it's not usually referred to as "CG".)

  The fog was not computer-generated, but it was instead real fog produced
using dry ice. The computer was involved in pasting patches of that real
fog into the film.

  The flames in the fireplaces were the most CG in the movie. They were done
primarily by making a flame animation by traditional hand-drawing, then
scanning the frames into the computer and coloring them using photoshop,
after which they were added to the film (similarly to how the fog was added).
You could argue that is CG, as photoshop was involved in the actual creation
process of the flames.

> 2D animation generally contains "CG" to some extent now as well.  Some 
> things are just easier if there is a computer involved.  But then, we all 
> know that here...  ;-) 

  Sometimes it just gets blurred what is "CG" and what isn't. Just because
a computer is used to post-process frames doesn't necessarily mean what is
usually meant with "CG".

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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