The Audience is Watching, But is the Audience Caring...???

[Alex]

"No special effects were used in the making of this film". This brief prologue appears at the front of a documentary called "Winged Migration". The Flying Bird Shots are so magical in this film that the filmmakers wanted you to know that they didn't alter reality in anyway. They were filmed in the sky as it happened, and weren't altered Digitally in anyway.

I put a similar notice at the end of my Super-8 film short film "The Alphabet Song". My notice said, "No digital cameras and no digital editing was used in the making of "Alphabet Song". I did this because the time-exposure shots could have been combined in post from two different sources.

In live theatre, a battle has raged over the use of "canned" music for "on Broadway" live theatrical performances. If it's a live performance, then let the band play on, live, and in person!

It's the same issue as testing athletes for illegal drug enhancers. Performers and creators want you to know that they created their vision from the real, natural world, rather than on a computer or via drugs.

Perhaps a final analogy could compare learning the multiplication tables via a calculator and never having learned how to multiply via paper and pencil.

But does the audience care how the image was created?

Should the audience care how the image was created? [img]rolleyes.gif[/img]

[nahie]

I say who cares, as long as the images move you in some way.

[Mike Buckles]

I think it's up to the individual filmmaker. In the case of your film, "The Alphabet Song", it was important for you to let them know it was all done optically...I think it made the audience appreciate the hard work and effort you put into it. I only saw still images, but the effects looked complicated, and knowing it was all done on film made me appreciate your talent even more!

[Alex]

If a baseball player can hit a ball five hundred feet specifically because they have bulked via drugs, should the fans not care? That would mean that the end does justify the means.

If you don't want a baseball analogy, how about ratings for movies. Why bother having ratings for movies at all? Audiences will either like the movie, or they won't, why bother with ratings?

[nahie]

Eh, I was just saying, digital or not, "I" don't care how images are produced, as long as they look good. Joe six-pack probably doesn't care either. Of course, Joe six-pack doesn't understand why any of us shoot super 8 in the first place. I like super 8 because it gives that great "retro" look that fits the subject of my movies. I like the grain and misc hairs on the image, and the unnatural colors of Kodachrome. If I could produce that look digitally, I probably would. It would be much cheaper and MUCH less of a hassle. But I can't (I've tried) so I still shoot super 8.

We have movie ratings because Joe Six-pack doesn't want to take his kids to movies with explicit sex scenes in them...and how would he know what is in the movie if he hasn't seen it? Or did you mean movie reviews?

[Alex]

I find your positioning on this issue something that you are sure of. Yet I see your position as fence straddling.

Are you saying that if you could make your movies with cyberactors that looked exactly like the real thing, that you would never want a distinction made between movies with real actors and movies with digital actors?

[nahie]

The important thing in any movie is story, not medium, actors (digital or not), camera, etc. (my opinion).

Speaking about digital actors, how about the animated movies Toy Story and Monsters Inc., etc? Those were "digital" actors, right? Sure, they were created digitally, but they were enacting the human condition outlined in the STORY. Those "digital" actors were animated by humans, either by human motion capture or hand.

Making a movie without anything digital. Sounds sorta like Paul Bunion vs the steam engine (I think? I forget the fable). Man vs. machine (or tool) has been argued probably since the first stone wheel was carved out of granite. Suit yourself, but I'll use machines if it does it better, faster and/or cheaper.

[Alex]

But no one tried to create the notion that Toy Story used real actors. We knew they were animated.

Would it bother you to know that I'm really a computer program and I don't really exist?

[nahie]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="verdana, sans-serif">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#DDDDDD"><font size=2 face="verdana, sans-serif">Originally posted by Forum-405:
Would it bother you to know that I'm really a computer program and I don't really exist?</font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>


I knew it! That is the only way you can be replying to my posts that fast at 2am! No I'm not a computer program - my excuse is I just got back from Korea and can't sleep tonight.

[Alex]

Ha ha ha. (uh oh, if they find out I can laugh, I'll be terminated).