ST Making of TFA(Digital compositing etc)

The work that was done in this movie was absolutely top notch.
I know digital effects and CGI has become sort of a dirty word around SW fandom,but I absolutely love the seamless work done in this movie,video below:

 

ITS SO DENSE!

 

Crap... I thought all that was real and digital was only used to remove wires? I'd have never guessed...

 

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At least there's something for the actors to react to. They're not just standing around in a green void while the director sits back and sips coffee behind his computer monitor. Sure, there are digital effects and some green screen but it's never overwhelming to the point where it hurts the film.

 

lol.

 

You miss the point. They understated the use of digital, and overstated the use of practical as a part of the films PR. This film had tons of visual effects in, even in scenes where one would have thought it easy to just do it 'in camera'. And it seems there were a number of scenes with actors acting against big chunks of green screen (all the scenes of Kylo and Snoke for one). I actually think TFA has a decent mix of the two (although the new environments are woefully unimaginative IMO), but don't buy into the notion that this was 'old school'.

 

I've never seen green screen hurt any of the movies yet. Actually all it does is enhance them.

TFA is packed with green screen and CGI all over the movie because that is simply the way movies work now.

 

I have a bad feeling about this....,

 

Abrams on every red carpet: "There's a ton of CGI in the film"

*BTS video shows there's a ton of CGI in the film*

Fans: "Abrams misled us! Look at all that CGI!"

 

I've noticed a lot of people didn't seem to watch extra features on DVDs, or else they would know just how all these visual effects methods are used together.
Speaking of which, with all these videos out there on YouTube, it doesn't even matter anymore if a disc has extra features.

 

Overall, I'm very impressed with how the special effects work turned out. It's all so seamless and almost never takes me out of the movie, and that's the best kind of VFX work: the kind where you're watching the movie and it never occurs to you that it's a special effect, but when you watch the Behind the Scenes you're like "Holy **** I thought that that was real!"

Also, can I say how tired I am of these **** measuring contests between fans when it comes to CGI usage? It never goes anywhere and only serves to further alienate the fanbase.

Mod edit: While I agree with the sentiment, keep it family friendly, please.

 

Damn it...This movie would look even more pleasing with Models at their tool belt.

 

Exactly. This is simply pure reality of making movies today.

http://www.studiodaily.com/2016/01/ilm-vfx-supervisor-roger-guyett-on-star-wars-the-force-awakens/

There was much talk leading up to the film’s release about the filmmakers’ supposed rejection of digital effects in favor of practical effects. The implication was that the practical effects in The Force Awakens brought back the “reality” of the early Star Wars episodes, a reality preferred by fans and critics of the prequels who complain about the digital effects. Guyett seems puzzled and fascinated by this, and somewhat astonished that some people are willing to believe there are few CG effects in the current film.

Studio Daily: I read an article recently that gave the impression that most of the effects were practical; that the only digital effects were the two CG characters and some spaceships; otherwise most of the CG work was wire removal.

Roger Guyett: We could be flattered by the benign dismissal of a massive piece of work. It’s flattering that people want to believe what they see. If we managed to achieve that, then we’ve succeeded. But 2,100 of the 2,500 shots in the film had digital effects. Hundreds of people [digital effects artists] worked on the show.

 

Yes, this. I for one, when viewing the first teaser, did not drop my jaw in awe and exclaim: "Wow they built a whole full scale crashed Star Destroyer in the desert!" On into the official trailers it was very apparent that CGI was significant part of the mix. When I first saw the above "Making ..." absolutely nothing surprised me. Studio sets and mat paintings and model shots alone - for action or fantasy films - simply will not work with today's audience. An intelligent and seamless mix of locations, sets, models, animatronics, and CGI takes skill and effort but the result is worth it. Though Abrams talked up the sets and locations, everything shown to the general public prior to the premier obviously had abundant CGI contributing to the whole.

 

This making of video really illustrates how Star Wars is no longer the vanguard of groundbreaking visual effects. It's detailed, state-of-the-art, finely crafted vfx work, but nothing that really deserves an Oscar. There's no evidence that it's done anything to move the industry forward. Abrams kept the effects in a very safe zone of doable photorealism, the same way he played it safe with the narrative and the overall iconography of the movie.

The OT and the PT pushed the envelope a lot more, to the point where all the old movies have at least one or two major effects that they couldn't quite perfect or didn't quite work. I like the occasional failures of the old movies.