Good CG Is Invisible CG

Your favorite movie or TV show uses way more CG ¹ than you realize.

For example, here are some visual effects breakdowns for Netflix’s Ripley (don’t worry, they’re short):

ℹ️ YouTube embeds removed to improve your chances of watching these videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e19_j5BFV_w (VFX by ReDefine)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoTzz1GBWeg (VFX by edi)

I live in New York and traveled to several of those regions in Italy last year. Those shots? Absolutely seamless… perfection. 👌🏽

“But Ripley’s based on a modern American classic. Those VFX should be seamless!”

OK, how about the VFX shots in a romantic comedy… from 2009?

(VFX by Brickyard VFX)

Or how about the VFX in a television drama, like NBC’s This Is Us?

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5555260/fullcredits (Do a Find for Series Visual Effects and start scroooolling.)

Do you remember those shows for their visual effects?

…

And that’s the point:

Good CG is invisible CG.

Show your love for the visual effects teams who tirelessly work to craft the shots, layers of shots, and elements that comprise the layers in those shots so we can sit back and get lost in a bit of movie magic.

About This Shirt

• The typeface is News Gothic and the color was derived from the 4K77 edition of Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope. My thanks to the Star Wars Comparison channel on YouTube for providing this meticulous comparison.
• I ran this design by Todd Vaziri at Industrial Light & Magic, and he didn’t hate it 😄. Actually, he was far kinder than that – thank you, Todd! Maybe we’ll see or hear about this in a future episode of Lighter Darker: The ILM Podcast.

I don’t like sounding dogmatic, but I also don’t want to sound apologetic for this next bit:

As movie fans, we should stop using the term “CGI”.

It’s fun to say and fun to use in conversation, but “CGI” stands for Computer-Generated Imagery. Originally, visual effects artists used this term to help decision makers and financiers see the need for adding computers to their toolbox. Now it implies that computers do all the work and humans have little or nothing to do with it.

Computers don’t make the moments we remember – people do.

And if you think this all smells of entitlement or privilege, you should really watch the four-part series “NO CGI” is really just INVISIBLE CGI featuring Visual Effects Supervisor Jonas Ussing. It’s astounding how far directors, producers, and actors will go to convince you, “Nope, no CGI in this movie,” because that narrative sells more tickets, rentals, and subscriptions.

• Part 1 (16:30)
• Part 2 (27:35)
• Part 3 (25:32)
• Part 4 (21:36)

Computer Graphics aren’t the problem, and purely practical visual effects don’t necessarily make for better, more effective, or less expensive shots.

Good CG is really invisible CG.

Now available at Cotton Bureau.

If you made it this far, use Coupon Code YTVUFFZR7F at checkout for a nice discount, or FREE99 for free shipping on all orders over $99 (USD) at Cotton Bureau.

Also, here’s a 16mm film scan of Episode IV’s opening crawl courtesy of the SG10 Film Archive channel on YouTube.

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