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Almost 30 years later, Jurassic Park CGI still looks real

TexMex

Gold Member
But we would have lost all those shots of people staring in wide eyed amusement.

I guess it’s that mix of horror and sappy that Spielberg does well. Would kill to see James Cameron’s take.

Yeah this has merit too. The effects are better but they're bolstered by an all time great. The original cast of characters is great, and we care about what happens to them.

I've seen them, but I couldn't tell you the name of any of those characters with a gun to my head.
 
not just the CGI itself

but the tastefulness of the animations

whoever directed and executed the animal movements really knew what they were doing

when i see them dinos they behave identically to the kind of things you see in nature docs

jurassic park from every angle is a masterpiece

look at the way those adults are reacting to the dinos, very convincing stuff

this was a movie made by serious passionate experts
 

Vick

Member
But we would have lost all those shots of people staring in wide eyed amusement.
And A+ directed sequences, and a completely different movie in general.

Jurassic Park is 80% Spielberg on basically everything.




It was his personal Jaws sequel, from how every sequence was shaped, planned and directed to the locations used, from who was casted to how the screenplay played out and characters were transformed, from how shots were framed to the notion of dinosaurs behaving like animals instead of monsters, from little visuals inputs like the vibrating glass of water to the ending of the movie, made up last moment by Spielberg in the middle of production as a personal response to the CG T-Rex tests, from the actual CG quality he was pushing for all the time from Poland to even the literal design of the dinosaurus.
That final T-Rex design for instance only came after Spielberg constant requested edits on the original Stan Winston maquette, which originally looked quite different and not nearly as good. The final CG Rex design is also all on Spielberg and Steve Williams.
When you look at the Making Of and especially when you read the Making Of book, you realize this movie is all on Spielberg.

Just like Cameron's movies were all on Cameron.

I guess it’s that mix of horror and sappy that Spielberg does well. Would kill to see James Cameron’s take.
I think i'm more of a Cameron fan than a Spielberg fan if we look at filmographies, but this is the Jurassic Park i'm happy we got.
That awe inducing and magic first half (which Cameron less successfully tried to emulate with Avatar 20 years later) could only come from Spielberg.
It also somewhat saddens me to say, but Cameron is technically inferior to Spielberg and not by a small margin.

Hell, Cameron only became a director after watching Jaws.
 
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SinDelta

Member
It's also the only good Jurassic Park movie 30 years later.
I think that The Lost World, terrible as it was, was the last movie that managed to retain some of the look, feel, eeriness, darkness and atmosphere of the first Jurassic Park movie.

Three was washed out and the only good thing were the memes.

I also have to admit to really liking the premise of Jurassic World even if the execution was ok at best.
 
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Birdo

Banned
Imperections in analogue film do old CGI a LOT of favours.

What we see in Jurrasic Park is Digital CGI converted to film, then converted to Digital. Giving it a softer and grainy look, which helps blend it into the live-action fotage.
 
That’s pretty cool^. Reminds me of what some musicians do by recording their digital tracks into analog tape then back to digital to capture that compression.
 
The movie is a masterpiece in every possible way. The thing that makes the CGI so impressive and unique is that they only used it when they really had to. 90s were the golden age of CGI because you really get the feel the film makers were breaking their head about how to do everything without CGI and only used it when there was no other way. Today it's like the other way around. It's sad.
 

zeioIIDX

Member
Holy shit, the raptors in the kitchen scene are CG?! I always thought those were practical effects and animatronics, daaaaang.
 

Alright

Banned
T1000 walking through that gate is still some of the best CGI in movies. And the added touch of the twist of the pistol? Perfection.
 

sol_bad

Member
I wouldn't say it looks real myself.
The skin texturing makes them look like they are made out of plato for example. It doesn't look like realistic scale texturing if you get what I mean.
 

Chiggs

Gold Member
No it doesn't. It looks bad in 4k, especially the first shot with the brachiosaurus.

The T-Rex stuff holds up well, largely because of the night shots, but this pervasive myth of JP's dinos not aging is just fanboy horseshit.
 

Vick

Member
I wouldn't say it looks real myself.
The skin texturing makes them look like they are made out of plato for example. It doesn't look like realistic scale texturing if you get what I mean.
They were made to emulate the animatronics, made of foam rubber.

No it doesn't. It looks bad in 4k, especially the first shot with the brachiosaurus.
It looks bad in 4K because that piece of shit of a disc you watched is not the Jurassic Park that hit theaters.

The T-Rex stuff holds up well, largely because of the night shots, but this pervasive myth of JP's dinos not aging is just fanboy horseshit.
Or maybe you should re-read OP and what this Thread is about.
There are multiple posts explaining things already.
 
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Chiggs

Gold Member
They were made to emulate the animatronics, made of foam rubber.


It looks bad in 4K because that piece of shit of a disc you watched is not the Jurassic Park that hit theaters.


Or maybe you should re-read OP and and what this Thread is about.
There are multiple posts explaining things already.

I read your posts. And they sucked.
 

Vick

Member
I read your posts. And they sucked.
Thanks.

Free to enjoy the UHD within your neanderthal level of understanding.

oljJwtE.jpg

JWuavmN.jpg

vk54UKl.jpg

ZAD07vr.jpg
 

Vick

Member
That doesn't make it look realistic than because the animatronics look fake too.
:)

I'm not hating though, it's my favourite JP movie.
Sure, just explained why they looked like that.
Stan Winston's practical maquettes were scanned by ILM and textures were made out of those, along with life size animatronics.
Same for compositing, which was supposed to blend perfectly to what was already shot on stage with the animatronics.
What people usually mean with "looks real" is that they look practical, that they look "in the scene".
 
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Chiggs

Gold Member
If I was a Jurassic Park dinosaur and I looked in the mirror and saw how poorly I had aged since 1993, I would jump off the screen and right into The Adventures of Young Sherlock Holmes, where I would promptly slit my own throat on that stained glass knight, which is far cooler. Or perhaps I would just have the T-1000 stab me through the eye sockets, since even a liquid metal dino would look cooler than the shit texturing and crap lightning they gave me in 1993.

#JPDinoslooklikeshit

#DennisMurendidthebesthecould

#LostWorldisashittiermoviebutthedinoslookbetter

#JPfanboysbelievetheirownbullshit
 
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Vick

Member
The Adventures of Young Sherlock Holmes, where I would promptly slit my own throat on that stained glass knight, which is far cooler.
Which walked right in front of every foreground object.

vIp8UOe.jpg

Or perhaps I would just have the T-1000 stab me through the eye sockets, since even a liquid metal dino would look cooler than the shit texturing and crap lightning they gave me in 1993.
Shit texturing and crap lighting:

CVNWGHJ.png


kwQUG45.png


sqTZizh.png


nkS3lo9.png


While praising this:

1m6uFH3.gif


And if you're making me trash talking what's probably my favourite movie ever, you fucked up real bad.

#JPDinoslooklikeshit
Said no one ever.

#LostWorldisashittiermoviebutthedinoslookbetter
Glad to see you agree that a better transfer, like TLW is, makes the CG look better.
That was my point.

#JPfanboysbelievetheirownbullshit
Sure. God of War also aged quite like shit after just a couple of years.

hBMh1Y0.jpg


C6U4UkT.png
 

Chiggs

Gold Member
Wow, Vick's eyesight does indeed work. I mean, after all, he spotted a flaw with the stained glass knight...and yet he continues to post shots of dinos cloaked in darkeness. Is he thick, disingenuous, or just too in love with his dinos to be objective?

Here, let me help. And to show you what a fair sport I am, here's JP at low-res, since anything beyond that is cheating to you. :messenger_grinning_squinting:

OMG THESE SHOTS ARE SO AMAZING AND THEY HAVEN'T AGED AT ALL! OH MY PRETTY DINOS! HOW LOVELY YOU ARE EVEN AFTER ALL THESE YEARS!

:messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy:

znzcalZ.png



:messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy:
iGR9nzr.png


:messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy:

AE3kDfG.png
 
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Vick

Member
26217eb569fe923961145ccd069c3bd2.gif


and yet he continues to post shots of dinos cloaked in darkeness.
Which is how the movie was shot, what ILM rendered and point of the entire Thread.
But again, feel free to keep cosplaying this guy:

giphy.gif


Here, let me help. And to show you what a fair sport I am, here's JP at low-res, since anything beyond that is cheating to you. :messenger_grinning_squinting:
...

It's an unprocessed 4K scan of 35mm.
35mm is 6K according to ARRI. It's what people saw in theaters.

OMG THESE SHOTS ARE SO AMAZING AND THEY HAVEN'T AGED AT ALL! OH MY PRETTY DINOS! HOW LOVELY YOU ARE EVEN AFTER ALL THESE YEARS!

:messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy::messenger_tears_of_joy:

znzcalZ.png
5y4OGnm.png

wDGqen4.png

5DTjjZO.png


Don't know, i think for being the worst shots of the first ever digital creatures made on what today would not even run Windows, they sure look more impressive than what's given to us after 30 years of advancements and 100+ million dollars:

jurassicworld2_final_17qqe.jpg


But i'm talking to someone that thinks this:

R98pZsx.gif


Is more impressive than this, made a mere year after:

MGOPPWw.gif


HOSBihE.gif


OsEq1Ib.gif


jh8iN0f.gif


NGE1hO7.gif


Q3l4V2M.gif


Probably my last answer to you, for the simple reason i'm way past my limit of brain cells lost in a single discussion.
 
I'm just super impressed there are so many people who have figured out that these aren't actually real dinosaurs. Bravo, geniuses! You certainly aren't fooled by 30 year old effects into thinking that unreal creatures existed in real life and were filmed on set with famous actors.
 
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sol_bad

Member
In a pretty long list of horrible takes, this one takes the cake.

Just because something is there on set doesn't mean it automatically "looks" real because it's there and can be touched. They still look like fake man made objects, especially when it comes to movement.
 

Chiggs

Gold Member
Probably my last answer to you, for the simple reason i'm way past my limit of brain cells lost in a single discussion.

How will I go on living my life without the ramblings of a giant dork who spends his time and energy defending old-ass CGI on a forum?! I mean, are you even in the industry? Please tell me you at least work in film. Because if this is how you spend your time...

Who am I kidding? Please, Vick, you’re so cool! Don’t abandon me!

The Brachs fucking suck, dude. They do not hold up. Also, JP came out 2 years after T2, so why’d you say a year? Surely a VFX pro like yourself knows the key dates.

And low res GIFs to prove your point? More bullshit from Vick.

I'm just super impressed there are so many people who have figured out that these aren't actually real dinosaurs. Bravo, geniuses! You certainly aren't fooled by 30 year old effects into thinking that unreal creatures existed in real life and were filmed on set with famous actors.

*Looks at the title of the thread*

It’s almost as if using a less bullshit title may have resulted in less snark and criticism. What a stunning concept!

If you want to believe that nobody in 1993 could tell that Sam Neil was not being chased by two dozen animatronic Gallimimuses (Gallimimi?), more power to you.

Dino-defender Vick knows all and sees all! And how dare you watch this film on your 4K TV, too. That’s against rules!

What rules?

The rules he pulls out of his asshole when someone critiques his precious little Dinos, which he strangely has no affiliation with, making his defense of them that much more strange. Childhood trauma? Brain damage? Who knows!

Now, back to rigging up my 35mm projector to watch JP the Vick way!
 
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Rat Rage

Member
Still THE BEST. This is what you get when you pair a legendary director with very talented cgi artists, cinematographers and animators, who only used cgi where it was necessary. Top of the top talent worked on Jurassic Park, that's why it will look amazing forever. Even in 100 years, it will still look amazing.
 
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Vick

Member
Also, JP came out 2 years after T2, so why’d you say a year? Surely a VFX pro like yourself knows the key dates.
Jurassic-Park-How-It-Revolutionized-Special-Effects-3.jpg


Because if this is how you spend your time...
Well, i'm in full lockdown on a nerd forum based on AV media, last time i checked.

How will I go on living my life without the ramblings of a giant dork who spends his time and energy defending old-ass CGI on a forum?!
Please, Vick, you’re so cool! Don’t abandon me!
More bullshit from Vick.
The rules he pulls out of his asshole when someone critiques his precious little Dinos, which he strangely has no affiliation with, making his defense of them that much more strange. Childhood trauma? Brain damage? Who knows!
Even on PM:
Do you also announce to the world when you review your friends list on Facebook? You know, one of those long, melodramatic posts where you put everyone on notice that you’re going through your list and that there—gasp—might be casualties?

Bwahahaha, who am I kidding? You have no friends.

P.S. JP dinos suck shit, and even though you have feelings for them, I think you should spend less time focusing on their needs and more time with your body pillow therapy.
Any particular reason behind such a meltdown?
 
real creatures which did exist*
Creatures that existed millions of years ago before humans even existed. All we have is fragments of bones to piece together approximations of what they might look like. These approximations - educated guesses - change with the introduction of new scientific information like feathers. These are digital re-creations of a certain approximation made at a specific time and place (early 90s) but there is no way to verify that this is what dinosaurs really looked like. Even our best guesses keep changing.

It is different from, say, CGI'ing a person in. We have seen people before in real life, it is a very natural form for us to resolve. This is why it is so easy to spot fake people. A dinosaur, we have remnants but nobody has or ever will see one in the flesh, alive, to accurately judge what it looks like. They can use scientific information but ultimately these are fantasy creations by people who grew up idolizing folks like Harryhausen.
 
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nkarafo

Member
Calm down. Maybe the title is a bit of a hyperbole. There are very few shots where the dinos look like real and these are mostly darker scenes where they aren't even show the whole creature. But even that is impressive enough for such an early use of CGI. And overall, it still looks more realistic than the modern JP sequels where they made the dinos look more like fantasy monsters instead of animals.

Also, yes, Terminator 2 CGI is pretty bad. It always looked weird but because it depicted a liquid metal robot, a strange concept by itself, it got a pass. But god, in some shots it looks like those 80's, retro-futuristic pre-rendered demos on the Amiga. It also gives me The Lawnmower Man vibes, which isn't a good thing.
 
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eot

Banned
26217eb569fe923961145ccd069c3bd2.gif



Which is how the movie was shot, what ILM rendered and point of the entire Thread.
But again, feel free to keep cosplaying this guy:

giphy.gif



...

It's an unprocessed 4K scan of 35mm.
35mm is 6K according to ARRI. It's what people saw in theaters.


5y4OGnm.png


wDGqen4.png


5DTjjZO.png


Don't know, i think for being the worst shots of the first ever digital creatures made on what today would not even run Windows, they sure look more impressive than what's given to us after 30 years of advancements and 100+ million dollars:

jurassicworld2_final_17qqe.jpg


But i'm talking to someone that thinks this:

R98pZsx.gif


Is more impressive than this, made a mere year after:

MGOPPWw.gif


HOSBihE.gif


OsEq1Ib.gif


jh8iN0f.gif


NGE1hO7.gif


Q3l4V2M.gif


Probably my last answer to you, for the simple reason i'm way past my limit of brain cells lost in a single discussion.
The effects in T2 were also very impressive for the time, and having a partially CGI'd main antagonist is pretty different from giant dinos that don't really interact with the actors. I agree that the way JP was shot still holds up better though. Same thing with Starship Troopers, both the CGI and miniatures work holds up really well because they knew their limitations.
 

nkarafo

Member
Can i ask, what color settings could we use to get that original look? Lower the saturation a bit? Playing with the hues? I use Pot-Player and it does have some real time color correction settings i could use to emulate that look.
 
We definitely have to give mad props to the duo of Steven Speilberg and George Lucas working together.

When you think about it, Jurassic Park is really in the same Classic Pulp Fiction genre that birthed Star Wars and Indiana Jones. They would always show giant dinosaur movies alongside those serials at the old movie theaters. Having this dream team together working on an update to another classic serial style adventure film is certainly a huge factor in why it looks so good. "Real" or not, for the pedants.

I guess it's like any project when the initial creators leave. When you hand direction and production off to other people, you really lose a lot of things. These aren't just talented filmmakers, they are the masters of their genre, at the peak of their powers. They had been working with effects-based storytelling for decades. Not just working with it, but revolutionized the field. Pixar and ILM and pretty much the entire CGI industry came from George and his franchise-happy cash cow of Lucasfilm. He personally witnessed and supervised the development of visual effects from physical to digital first-hand. Having anybody else do the other movies was likely always going to end in a worse result.

It's not like any of the modern filmmakers have ever made a movie like E.T. or Raiders of the Lost Ark or Close Encounters of the Third Kind or Jaws or Poltergeist or all of the above. They just don't have it. The chops aren't there. Maybe film school got worse. Maybe the new people don't have proper respect or education for animation tradition. Maybe digital filmmaking makes things too easy and you don't have to plan things out as much anymore. Maybe the effects industry is too streamlined and consolidated. Maybe the industry prioritized the wrong things as it shrank and killed the theaters.

I dunno. The reason of why things suck now could be a huge topic on it's own.
 
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I guess it's like any project when the initial creators leave. When you hand direction and production off to other people, you really lose a lot of things. These aren't just talented filmmakers, they are the masters of their genre, at the peak of their powers. They had been working with effects-based storytelling for decades. Not just working with it, but revolutionized the field. Pixar and ILM and pretty much the entire CGI industry came from George and his franchise-happy cash cow of Lucasfilm. He personally witnessed and supervised the development of visual effects from physical to digital first-hand. Having anybody else do the other movies was likely always going to end in a worse result.

It's not like any of the modern filmmakers have ever made a movie like E.T. or Raiders of the Lost Ark or Close Encounters of the Third Kind or Jaws or Poltergeist or all of the above. They just don't have it. The chops aren't there. Maybe film school got worse. Maybe the new people don't have proper respect or education for animation tradition. Maybe digital filmmaking makes things too easy and you don't have to plan things out as much anymore. Maybe the effects industry is too streamlined and consolidated. Maybe the industry prioritized the wrong things as it shrank and killed the theaters.

I dunno. The reason of why things suck now could be a huge topic on it's own.
I think all of the above, but most importantly computers killed true artistry in some fields and replaced artists with clerks. As an example the most effective concept artist in the 21st century is the one who can copy paste together something accepteble from other sources in the shortest amount of time, which is like the opposite of what people like Ralph Mcquarrie were about.
 
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Vick

Member
Can i ask, what color settings could we use to get that original look? Lower the saturation a bit? Playing with the hues? I use Pot-Player and it does have some real time color correction settings i could use to emulate that look.
It's simply impossible, unfortunately. People tried to match the current HV versions with 35mm via advanced color matching tools (like Dr Dre's), but the color information is simply not there on discs. There are fan's "35mm recreations" sourced from official releases on Youtube, and you'll see they all look awful.
Even forgetting color depth, gamma and white balance really play a huge role, you should completely mess with WB to oblivion to get acceptable results, but since this varies from shot to shot on BD it would lead nowhere.
Another problem with the processed (DNR) UHD is that CG shots look infinitely softer than the live-action footage, and while this should happen regardless because of how the negatives were scanned by ILM at the time, we know for a fact that they were much sharper and more detailed compared to what's on disc.
 

Kimahri

Banned
How will I go on living my life without the ramblings of a giant dork who spends his time and energy defending old-ass CGI on a forum?! I mean, are you even in the industry? Please tell me you at least work in film. Because if this is how you spend your time...

Who am I kidding? Please, Vick, you’re so cool! Don’t abandon me!

The Brachs fucking suck, dude. They do not hold up. Also, JP came out 2 years after T2, so why’d you say a year? Surely a VFX pro like yourself knows the key dates.

And low res GIFs to prove your point? More bullshit from Vick.



*Looks at the title of the thread*

It’s almost as if using a less bullshit title may have resulted in less snark and criticism. What a stunning concept!



Dino-defender Vick knows all and sees all! And how dare you watch this film on your 4K TV, too. That’s against rules!

What rules?

The rules he pulls out of his asshole when someone critiques his precious little Dinos, which he strangely has no affiliation with, making his defense of them that much more strange. Childhood trauma? Brain damage? Who knows!

Now, back to rigging up my 35mm projector to watch JP the Vick way!
I'm not sure what it is about this thread that gets you so worked up, but it's pretty clear you really don't understand what Vick is talking about, you act like a 12 year old, and you should probably go get some air.

Deep breaths bro.

In other news, this thread has really made me want a transfer of that original film. God damn what a difference.
 

Chiggs

Gold Member
Don't insult people.
Any particular reason behind such a meltdown?

Because you’re an idiot? And a disingenuous one at that. That JP Dino test is a giant hunk of shit, btw.


The dinosaurs look like they are running at a totally different frame rate to the rest of the movie

And they also look like ass.


I'm not sure what it is about this thread that gets you so worked up, but it's pretty clear you really don't understand what Vick is talking about, you act like a 12 year old, and you should probably go get some air.

Deep breaths bro.

In other news, this thread has really made me want a transfer of that original film. God damn what a difference.

Feel free to read the title of this thread. We can chat afterwards.
 
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Animagic

Banned



I always hear that the reason the movie hold up is because of the use of animatronics, and while it's certainly true this shouldn't detract from the fact that the at-the-time sperimental CGI still looks absolutely mindblowing.

I mean, look at that shit. So not only the Home Video and Netflix releases with their ridiculous color grading made the movie look like a cheap TV product, they also made the film CGI much more dated and fake looking than it actually was.

Color grading has really overstayed it’s welcome
 
I think all of the above, but most importantly computers killed true artistry in some fields and replaced artists with clerks. As an example the most effective concept artist in the 21st century is the one who can copy paste together something accepteble from other sources in the shortest amount of time, which is like the opposite of what people like Ralph Mcquarrie were about.
For real. We see the same thing across the arts. Automation/mechanization is a double edged sword.

A lot of it is also, these new people are less talented, or at least less trained. They are babes compared to the old giants. People like Ralph McQuarrie are classically trained. He worked for Boeing and even CBS News during their coverage of the Apollo missions, turning in work that was on a high technical and artistic level. He also survived a tour in the Korean War where he was shot in the head. He did a LOT before he started work on the movies we know.

The modern kids animating things in CGI factories have completely different upbringings. Same goes for the directors. George Lucas and that generation personally knew people that were in Vietnam. Oliver Stone was one of those vets. Do you see J.J. Abrams or Rian Johnson ever fighting in a war?
 
Unfortunately that blend of CG and practical effects from the 90s and 00s is becoming a lost art. You still get it from time to time, but the magic is gone.

The Hobbit is a perfect example. The production teams did amazing work, but the end product fell well short of Lord of the Rings despite the advancements in technology.
 

Vick

Member
The dinosaurs look like they are running at a totally different frame rate to the rest of the movie
T-Rex breakout scene and Raptors in the kitchen were animated by stop motion artists at regular film speed 24 frames per second, using these tools:

D4ChK9dWAAAKLju.jpg


ETSPIQUU8AAWmAe.jpg


With a later digital pass to make it 100% smooth.

Keyframe animations for the rest of the scenes, had this "secret sauce":




And that's why when i see them they give me the impression of real life footage akin to what i would see on a Animal Planet documentary, and the reason why when i watch any Jurassic World movie i feel i'm looking at a cartoon made by cheaply hired "artists" who have no idea oh what gravity and weight is and never stepped outside of the studios to study the real world.
 
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