Miniatures, visual effects, special effects.......

[minieffects]

Its kind of sad that on the "VFX Talk" forum their is nothing for miniatures and practical effects. Then again it seems that so many in the vfx industry today have no clear idea what practical effects are and what the differences between visual effects and special effects really is.
The truth is they are the almost the same thing for the most part, however typically anyone working with first unit production creating bullet hits, explosions or mechanical rigs for in camera shots are considered "Special Effects" and anyone working in 2nd unit/post production are visual effects.
The lines are bit blurred today due to the increase in digital effects and the ever present vfx crews that are with production. And the truth is we use the same techniques for 2nd unit and post work as they do for first unit.
But there is still a clear distinction between what someone like Chris Corbould does on a film and what John Knolls job is for example. Chris is considered "special effects" , John is considered "Visual Effects" but not because John works only digitally and Chris only works practically. One is done during production the other is done during post production regardless of the tools or methods used. Yes someone like John is ever present during production but to make sure that what is shot is usable for post production or to work with special effects crews to better enhance the shots using practical and digital methods. Chris will prep his work and execute during shooting. Once shooting is complete "Special effects" are wrapped and its on to "visual effects". But even in the post world "special effects" are used in conjunction with miniature and digital effects during the "visual effects" process.

It would be nice to see the old school ways represented here if even from a nostalgic standpoint.

thanks for listening.

[DanLangella]

I wouldn't necessarily say miniatures and Special FX are complete dinosaurs. A lot of big productions still use them in conjunction with Visual FX. Some of the coolest scenes from The Dark Knight (for example) were miniatures and special fx - such as the batbike scene with the trucks. I'm sure there are numerous more examples.

D

[minieffects]

Hi Dan,

Im not suggesting that they are dinosaurs, quite the opposite in fact, however as time goes on there are fewer and fewer films that use them. Having worked in miniatures for 21 years I can tell you from personal experience that the number of jobs has decreased greatly since the introduction of digital effects. That coupled with visual effects supervisors who come from a digital background vs. a practical effects background in many cases have no understanding of miniatures or practical effects or how to use them in conjunction with digital effects. Yes there are exceptions but for the most part a visual effects supervisor with a digital background will seek a digital solution first simply because its what they know.
I would love to see miniatures, practical effects and digital effects seen for what they truly are, tools in the toolbox. You use the right tool or combination of tools to make the shot work and support the story. That is what our jobs are supposed to be, to support the story, not show boat the latest particle animation software or how clever we can be with miniatures or pyro. I feel that visual effects companies have gotten to caught up in their own hype. A lot of them have lost sight of what our jobs are supposed be and now its about trying to out do the vfx done last year. In my humble opinion.


By they way, thank you. I worked on The Dark Knight miniatures of the tumbler hitting the garbage truck. You can also see a lot of our miniature work in Shutter Island as well. Every shot of the light house and ward C is a miniature. Perfect example of digital and practical/miniature effects used to support the story.

Thanks for listening.

I wouldn't necessarily say miniatures and Special FX are complete dinosaurs. A lot of big productions still use them in conjunction with Visual FX. Some of the coolest scenes from The Dark Knight (for example) were miniatures and special fx - such as the batbike scene with the trucks. I'm sure there are numerous more examples.

D

[andrewhake]

I agree it would be great to see VFXtalk expanded a bit more to cover other adjacent aspects of filmmaking.

[Dotcommer]

Scott, its awesome to see you on the forums here. I've always been a fan of miniature work and I always enjoy comping with elements that were miniatures (or bigatures) because they just have a realism to them that I think we STILL can't completely replicate with the machine. You've worked on so many films that I love and grew up with. I have a ton of questions, but i'll spare you and just say "awesome work".

[georgeivan]

Dark night work its just awesome,i love little details

I will kill for that mini batmovile

[minieffects]

Thanks Dotcommer,

Im glad to be here and if you have questions please, ask away!

best,
scott

Scott, its awesome to see you on the forums here. I've always been a fan of miniature work and I always enjoy comping with elements that were miniatures (or bigatures) because they just have a realism to them that I think we STILL can't completely replicate with the machine. You've worked on so many films that I love and grew up with. I have a ton of questions, but i'll spare you and just say "awesome work".

[minieffects]

Thank you,

We would have liked to have kept it but the studio wouldnt hear of it. I did get to drive the mini tumbler a few times. You cant help feeling like batman when you drive it. Even if it was a miniature.

s

Dark night work its just awesome,i love little details

I will kill for that mini batmovile

[Aruna]

Hey Scott! I remember seeing some of the mini Tumbler in Nick's portfolio when we met up for a lunch one day. Great miniature work. I really miss those types of effects in movies today!

Quick question. I guess a lot of the miniatures today are designed in the computer, then created using a CNC machine. Do you do a lot of RPM work as well? Can you give a quick overview of the process? I haven't taken up Nick's offer to take me on a tour of New Deal yet, it was a busy winter!

I recently picked up a miniature lathe and mill setup from Sherline, to do my own types of miniatures. Can't wait to get into it.

[minieffects]

Hi Aruna,

I cant really speak for other companies or productions but at New Deal we use 3D modeling to design all of our sets. Specifically Rhino 3D and Solidworks. New Deal has its own 3D printer on site but as far as laser cutting and CNC work we farm it out.

To explain the process I think its important to explain the reasons we use the 3d software that we do. We model in nurbs, I know, a bad word in the cg world but its for the simple reason that its accurate and scalable. Maya, Modo, Sketchup, Lightwave are all great software but they are all geared towards animation and rendering and not optimized for manufacturing. Now its not to say that you cant model an object in Maya as polys and export it out for rapid prototyping, you can. But the real trick with polys is resolution, not pixel resolution, but build or cutting resolution. You see most models built in polys have low poly counts to keep the file small and this is fine for rendering and animation. But for rapid prototyping and cnc cutting its bad simply because the machines cut or print what they see. For example if you have a box with round corners and the corners are made up of 6 poly surfaces then if you were to RP or cnc cut that part your going to get a surface that is faceted. Now you can have the opposite problem with poly counts that are too high (Z-Brush models) for example. Often times the files are so large that the software for the machines cant handle the high polycounts so its important to find a happy medium.

So the process:
First we model the object but you need to close the object, meaning no open surfaces for rapid prototyping. Each object must represent a closed solid for this process. Once the object is valid it is exported as an .stl for RP. Again you can do this will polys but if there are any openings or naked edges the part will not be valid or "water tight".
For cnc cutting you really only need a surface because the cnc software creates a cutting path based on your surface. But the smoothness of the surface is important and you must also realize that the smallest detail you can cut is based on the smallest cutting tool available for the machine you are using.
We use both of these processes quite a bit however the old ways are still alive and used. Rapid prototyping, CNC, and laser cutting are simply new tools in the tool box.

Hope this answers your question.

s

Hey Scott! I remember seeing some of the mini Tumbler in Nick's portfolio when we met up for a lunch one day. Great miniature work. I really miss those types of effects in movies today!

Quick question. I guess a lot of the miniatures today are designed in the computer, then created using a CNC machine. Do you do a lot of RPM work as well? Can you give a quick overview of the process? I haven't taken up Nick's offer to take me on a tour of New Deal yet, it was a busy winter!

I recently picked up a miniature lathe and mill setup from Sherline, to do my own types of miniatures. Can't wait to get into it.

[georgeivan]

I suppose you already know it you have a plugin to reduce poly count preserving details

I only used once and its very cool it preserve detail very well

http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?t=71265

zbrush its beginning to have cool tools to model mechanical models,i know not accurate as nurbs but its just the beginning

http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?t=082326

[minieffects]

Yes I am aware of it, Legacy Effects uses it for their files. No its not as accurate but in a pinch you use what you have.

I suppose you already know it you have a plugin to reduce poly count preserving details

I only used once and its very cool it preserve detail very well

http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?t=71265

zbrush its beginning to have cool tools to model mechanical models,i know not accurate as nurbs but its just the beginning

http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?t=082326

[Cobaltmax]

Hi Scott. I'm a big fan of miniature work. It's unfortunate it's not as used today as it used to be. I watched your behind the scenes videos. Amazing work!
I'm curious. Today in the industry with all the CGI running rampant, what is it that most influences the decision to use miniatures instead of 3D? Is it the director's wish (I hear Nolan doesn't like CGI and prefers practical effects), the convenience (it seems it's much easier to break and blow stuff up for real than in 3D) or is it the price (I guess there was a time when miniatures were still cheaper than 3D, but I'm not sure this still the case)?

Thanks Scott and keep up the awesome work!

[Gravy]

Great thread going here. If I ever become a bigshot VFX supervisor I'll be sure to get some minatures in there (if still viable by then ). Your work on Batman was stunning, as was Kerner Opticals work on the latest Terminator.

[minieffects]

Hi Scott. I'm a big fan of miniature work. It's unfortunate it's not as used today as it used to be. I watched your behind the scenes videos. Amazing work!
I'm curious. Today in the industry with all the CGI running rampant, what is it that most influences the decision to use miniatures instead of 3D? Is it the director's wish (I hear Nolan doesn't like CGI and prefers practical effects), the convenience (it seems it's much easier to break and blow stuff up for real than in 3D) or is it the price (I guess there was a time when miniatures were still cheaper than 3D, but I'm not sure this still the case)?

Thanks Scott and keep up the awesome work!

Hi Cobaltmax,

You know there are a lot of reasons to be honest, some good, some bad. When I started in the business it was just a given that if you had a shot that required movement past something or a fly over a town or city or an explosion, and it couldnt be built full size do to budget or physical restrictions, you used miniatures. For more panoramic wide shots with little or no parallax shift you used a matte painting.
Once CG was introduced we started to see a lot of those miniature jobs going away. Not because CG was better or cheaper but simply because it was new. Now as time goes on we see CG improving, matte paintings moving from the 2d world to the 3D world. But there is one major change that has slowly happened that has affected the use of miniatures. CG artists becoming the VFX supervisors. Now you have someone who has never shot a miniature, worked with model makers or dealt with scale. They simply have no understanding because its not where they came from. The older VFX supervisors were DP'S or miniature supervisors or Matte Painters.
These days miniatures are mostly used as "action miniatures" , explosions, crashes, collapsing buildings, etc....The things that CG cant quite do well just yet. There are exceptions to the rule of course because there are Supervisors out there that still believe in miniatures and still use them. Rob Legato is one of them. The work we did for him on The Aviator and more recently on Shutter Island demonstrates this.
Directors also have particular tastes, some really prefer the look of CG and dont like miniatures or want all the control in their hands, some feel the opposite and that can have an affect on the methods used.
Chris Nolan likes reality, he prefers as much as possible to be practical but he is a film maker first, its about the shot and what will deliver the shot within the context of the story. Now some say miniatures are too expensive, some say CG is too expensive, well that opinion is subjective simply because anything can be too expensive if you didnt allow enough money to to what you needed in the first place. I hear the same complaints about money from digital guys that have been hearing for 20 years from miniature and practical effects guys. Nothing has changed really.

For me and those of us that have worked at New Deal Studios, its about the shot. Its always been about the shot, making it look as real as possible , using what ever tools or combination of tools are necessary. Think about it, would you use Maya to do all of your compositing or editing? No, we use miniatures, practical effects, digital effects, what ever it takes to make the shot work. Its not about a single method being better than another, its about what works the best for the shot.
The funny thing is more and more often miniatures have become the last resort, the safety net for some. Digital effects companies will spend six months trying to accomplish a shot, developing new software, trying different methods and burning through cash. Then at the end, sometimes two weeks before the release of a film, we get a call to build a miniature and shoot it in two weeks for almost no money because they have used up 80% of the budget trying a digital solution. This happened simply because they were either over confident that they could do it digitally or simply had no understanding of miniatures and were hesitant. Who knows the real reason but this has happened quite a few times over the years.

My feeling is we are visual effects artists. If you are going to carry this title then you must have an understanding of all methods used to accomplish a shot not just one. You dont have to know how to build miniatures or composite or animate but you should know how these tools can all work together to accomplish the shot. Understand the history of visual effects and find out just how much of what you thought was developed only in the digital age has actually been around for 100 years. Its simply been applied and updated using digital technology.

As far as it being easier to blow up or break apart a miniature vs. doing it digitally? I wouldnt say its easier simply because there are a lot of factors that go into something like say the crash in the Dark Knight. There was an enormous amount of engineering that went into that, months of fabrication. What makes it different is we are struggling with the physics of trying to pull off a shot like that. How does the tumbler hit a truck twice its size and survive, how do we fit the camera in the space allowed. Once the shot starts, things like gravity, weight, lighting, dust, movement all happen automatically because we have designed things to move in a certain way.
Digital methods can accomplish the movement easier than we can but making it look real is the challenge there. Things that happen naturally with miniatures has to be figured out in CG and in some cases is over worked to the point that it doesnt look real.

Always keep your options open, dont be so quick to dismiss a method simply because you dont understand it or because you have seen a bad example of that method used.

Sorry for the long reply, I hope this answers your question.

best
scott