In recent years, with the rapid development of science and technology and the rapid rise of the emerging industry, computer and software technology gradually become mature, digital software began to play an important role in the film and television art, all kinds of fantasy and real scenes, roles are stimulate the visual nerve of the audience, people are more excited for digital realistic film and television. The ZBrush software developed by Pixologic, it opened up a new door for artists to create realistic 3D characters. Davy Jones in the Pirates of the Caribbean, Na’vi from Avatar, the robots in Transformers, these difficult, super realism characters in film almost all made from Zbrush, the birth of it represents a revolution in the digital modeling creation.

1. Development of traditional and modern realistic art

In the history of human art development, people are always constantly exploring various forms of expression for creation, such as ink painting, oil painting, printmaking, watercolor painting, gouache painting…In order to express the specific era of human customs, social environment and the artist’s own thoughts and feelings. In order to more truly express the scene in the creator’s mind, hyperrealism was born. Hyperrealistic painting art is a form of artistic expression in which the artist combines the objects depicted with People’s Daily life experience, and carries out in-depth and detailed depiction and expression of its external outline, internal texture, and detailed texture. With vivid and lifelike visual images, hyperrealistic painting makes the people believe the real existence of visual content in their subjective consciousness. Because of this kind of artistic characteristics that enables the continuous inheritance and innovative development of hyperrealistic painting. Until the 1839, the birth of the first camera, photography brought hyperrealistic art into a new stage, it can instantly records the characteristics of the real thing, even can make moving images, combined with performance elements such as sound, colour, light, let the realism  reached a new peak, the audience had a more stereoscopic and intuitive perception to the roles. After the last century 50-60’s, computer technology began to formally apply to the field of painting art. Digital painting art has irreplaceable advantages over traditional painting art in terms of storage mode, spreading process and material cost. It has injected fresh blood into modern art and opened up the expression technique of realistic painting art. With its diversified, scientific and team-based modern creation environment, digital painting art and film art are mutually dependent, and find a new balance between artistry and commercialization.

2. ZBrush artwork style: a more delicate and realistic style of hyperrealism

Digital sculpture software represented by ZBrush is still influenced by traditional painting and sculpting methods in the representation of realistic characters in films. It continues to follow several realistic artistic methods including representational, exaggerated and fantasy, and adds its own strong technical expertise. It is easier to show the static and dynamic image of the role in the virtual environment, and make the character of the role more distinct. The art style has more visual tension. 

(1)representational realism

The representational expression is the closest to reality in the artistic creation of realistic painting, and it is also the easiest way to make the audience have a sense of visual reality. It was the early artists’ fascination with realism that made them strive to explore a higher level of hyper-realism art form, thus giving birth to the production of camera technology. Of course, nature provides the most direct material for the representation of film characters. However, as artistic creation, but also need to use the idealized color, light, texture, atmosphere to render. It is difficult to achieve the aesthetic feeling of artistic creation like painting by imaging at one time, and most cases have to be photographed and corrected repeatedly. Film creators have to choose the best shooting time according to different time, weather and so on. They also have to consider the situations of the character actors themselves. Although with a variety of makeup and camera technology innovation, but also can not easily change some irreversible shooting obstacles. For example, when Hollywood actor Paul Walker died in an accident, the production of the film Fast and Furious 7 was stopped for a time. However, in order not to affect the release of the film, Paul Walker’s two younger brothers could only act as stand-ins to complete the unfinished parts of the film for his brother. But Walker’s temperament is difficult to reproduce in the film, so a lot of CG technology was used to recreate his looks. Therefore, to a large extent, the performance of film character types based on camera is a passive choice. ZBrush features allow traditional painting and film shooting to get rid of their limitations, realize the combination of art, leads the role of the representational realism to a new width. On the one hand, the photos and images recorded by photography become the original material, which can be used in a variety of scenes through repeated copying and comparison of computer technology. On the other hand, it fully combines the artistic creators’ requirements for artistic effects, and does not need to use tedious techniques of artificial makeup, It can be adjusted with CG technology to show colors, textures that can’t be photographed normally. In Night at the Museum, the team recreated a huge, long-lost fossil of a T-Rex. When the T-rex appeared on the screen in lifelike realist form, the audience was shocked. T-Rex has more than 400 bones, each of which was created by 3D software, especially in the close-up of the skull, which is realistic and requires more convincing details. The designer used ZBrush to complete all the details on the bones. Therefore, given that representational realism is basically base to the real prototype, Zbrush has obvious advantages in presenting popular science, historical records or other characters that reflect the existence of objective reality.

(2).exaggerative realism

I’m sure many people have seen the movie Avatar directed by James Cameron. The technology used in the movie was a remarkable achievement in that year. ZBrush software is involved in creating these exaggerated and convincing hyperrealistic character types. The exaggerated realistic method also deforms or exaggerates the characteristics of the creation objects on the basis of respecting the rules of character modeling, so as to enhance the character characteristics to achieve real visual effects. In the film Avatar, we can see the exaggerated design of Na’vi, a resident of Pandora, but it generally follows the modeling characteristics of human beings, enlarging their body size and having slender limbs. When upright, the wrist is longer than the hip, which is suitable for climbing and walking. The waist is thin, the body is thin, but the muscle is very developed, which adds a kind of beauty of power, showing the  Na’vi is in a kind of primitive living condition, which is harmonious and natural. Compared with other 3D digital software, ZBrush can achieve this transformation of the character more easily, and by adding a large number of surface details, such as blue fluorescent skin with patterns, clearly visible blood vessels and nerves, realistic scars, etc., the audiences can enjoy the visual experience that traditional painting and realistic photography cannot achieve. ZBrush is close to the characteristics of painting and sculpture, so that the creator can achieve exaggerated processing on the facial expression, body, movement and other body states of the character under the free control of subjective consciousness. The high-definition material of photography can be directly used to easily achieve realistic high-precision detail performance. In view of ZBrush’s breakthrough in digital art technology, its performance in the shaping of some exaggerated characters in modern films is more and more powerful, and the application needs are more and more extensive. Such as The Hulk, King Kong and other excellent character creations are the best illustration.

(3) Fantasy realism

Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction set in a fictional universe, often inspired by real world myth and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and drama. From the twentieth century it has expanded further into various media, including film, television, graphic novels, manga, animated movies and video games. Therefore, compared with representational and exaggeration, Fantasy has higher aesthetic value and is more difficult to express. The artistic image of fantasy has its unique expression in painting, literature, drama and other artistic works, but in terms of technology, in the past film and television performance is in a weak situation. The main problem is that the artistic images of fantasy are invisible and non-existent in the real physical world. Traditional makeup technology and photography technology are difficult to show the visual form from human brain, while digital technology makes it a reality. ZBrush software has more unique advantages in fantasy character creation. It can  arbitrarily combine the character model, simulate the material, texture, hair, cloth and other physical effects, and endow the character with more delicate details, make it come alive. In particular, audiences who are used to watching dull animated character images tend to feel boring, and the more distant the character is from reality, the more interesting it will be. Especially some monsters, robots and other roles that have even become the favorite of young people. At the same time, In the shaping of fantasy realistic characters, creators have more freedom of expression. Through the collision of the character’s characteristics and the audience’s subconscious, the audience’s perception of the character’s connotation is touched. Present deeper inner feelings and deeper thematic thinking. The future of digital characters, no matter how novel their appearance or how advanced their technology. The mainstream of its development is bound to serve the creators of more delicate, rich human nature thoughts and emotional communication. Just like the two series of Godzilla and King Kong, the film atmosphere is rendered with the fear of human beings to the huge unknown creatures, and the creator’s expectation for human beings to love nature is also expressed. Therefore, when the bizarre lifelike appearance and entertainment go to the peak, if there is a fuller human nature and emotional creation, will be more able to win the public praise.

Bibliography

En.wikipedia.org. 2021. Fantasy. [online] Available at: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasy> [Accessed 16 January 2021].

HOLMES, A., 2015. The Difference Between Photorealism And Hyperrealism. [online] Plus One Gallery. Available at: <https://www.plusonegallery.com/blog/32/> [Accessed 16 January 2021].

Overmental. 2015. Furious 7: Which Shots Of Paul Walker Were CGI? – Overmental. [online] Available at: <https://overmental.com/content/furious-7-which-shots-of-paul-walker-were-cgi-41530> [Accessed 16 January 2021].

https://vimeo.com/501232926

Password: sean

The movies I choose is John Wick chapter 1-3, I have watched them all in one day. Let’s talk about the first one, apparently this is a pure action movie without too many storylines. It just a reclusive killer turns to revenge after being attacked and robbed by a bunch of punks. Although the story is simple, it is clear, and the great action scenes make the movie more complete.

The director explained very clearly, like all the movie in the gangster protagonist, John killed countless people, but finally retired because of a woman . He and his wife lived in a safe, stable, harmonious town, with a big house, decent status, and a lot of money. He and his wife used to go to the beach for vacations, and when they were free, they would go out racing in his Mustang. This is the life every middle-aged male yearns for. Even until the sudden death of his wife, his life was not completely deprived. Because he had something to hang on to again, which is the little dog that his wife had given him. The main character John Wick has completed his transformation in the opening introduction, until some bad kids killed his dog, stolen his car and forced him to get back to his old life.

There are two characters influence the story. One is the kid who kill John’s dog, he changes John’s life, he makes the story goes to other direction. The other one is the kid’s father, Viggo, who is the boss of a Russian gang. John has worked for him before he retired. Through Viggo’s dialogues we know John’s personality and the reason of his revengement. He is a man of focus, commitment and sheer will. He retired because of a women. But the punks showed up and killed his dog, which is the first creature he had just begun to learn to love since his wife died, It also killed his future. It seemed to John’s key to a stable, normal life had been stolen from him. So he rejected Viggo’s compromise and decided to revenge. Not because of nervousness, but really just want to recapture the quiet ordinary life.

Eventually he killed Viggo and his son, and received the other dog from a dog pound.

In the beginning of chapter two, John Wick is going to kill a other Russian gang, just for bringing the car back. This is juts a appetizer, after finished that, the new story begins.

At the beginning of the story, we learn a little about John’s past, as well as some of the new settings of the gangster society. John Wick has needed the help of Italian Mafia boss Santino to run into a debt of gratitude, which is recorded by a prop known as the Marker. In the rules of this gangster society, a debt due to a Marker must be paid or it will be “disposed of”. Because of this, John has no choice so he embarks on a journey to Rome, trying to assassinate Santino’s sister in order to help him get a place in the Mafia round table. Unfortunately, after John succeeds, Santino goes back on his word and tries to kill him, which leads to the story that John must kill Santino.

Through the mouth of the hotel manager, who has a good relationship with John, we also learn some secrets about the underworld, the mysterious continental hotel — No blood on the continental ground, every marker mute be honored. Who breaks the rules will be killed by the high table. This settings not only show that the world is full of rules and regulations, but also suggests that there is a deeper, darker force in the world that ensures that these rules are enforced. At the same time, chapter 2 also explains the scale of the underworld, such as the tailoring shops that provided resources for the underworld, the street gangs that raised pigeons, and tattooed ladies in the bounty hunter department. And our main character, John Wick, whose face is recognized anywhere in the world.

At the end of the story, he kills Santino in the continental, breaks the rules. Then he’s going to be hunted down by killers all over New York, leads to the story of the chapter 3.

The chapter 3 is even more simple, telling the story of John Wick escapes and returns during the excommunicado. In this highly generalized story, the directors cleverly hide the vast worldview they have constructed, a murderous, religious, and slightly futuristic gray reality world.

He ran to the library, China town, Tarkovsky theater, Casablanca, the dessert, then back to New York for revenge. At the same time, an adjudicator from high table tracing John Wick and punished people who helped him after the excommunicado. In the end, John Wick and Winston fight against adjudicator’s men and win. At the same time, the street gangster are very angry about high table, he and John will declare the war to high table in chapter 4.

Note on course:

story as a circle:

story as a curve

Hero’s journey

The movie I choose for this topic is The gangster, The cop, The devil. It’s not a high score movie, but I’m very enjoy it.

I will start to breakdown by using the 8 stages:

1. You: The serial killer K is a sadistic psychopath, he kill a random person on a car at night like normal and left no evidence. The cop Jung Tae-seok is a maverick person, he has been always tracing where K is staying. The crime boss Jang Dong-soo runs many gambling stores in Korea, he recently has been doing the business with other criminal gang. But the chief of police has been bought off by Jang Dong-soo, so

2. Need: K keeps doing his indiscriminate murder plan, but his chosen target tonight happens to be Jang Dong-soo, who returns home alone at night. After the fight, Jang Dong-soo get injured ,K can’t kill him and run. Jang Dong-soo wants to kill K, and Jung Tae-seok has a chance to find K.

3. Go: K has failed at the first time, he got injured, he left his car and ran away. Jung Tae-seok ask the chief of the police office to deal with this case. But the chief was bought off by Jang Dong-soo, so he won’t touch any case regarding to Jang Dong-soo. Therefore, Jung Tae-seok has decided by his own to find Jang Dong-soo, and make a deal with him to catch K together. From here, they are all enter an unfamiliar situation.

4: Search: Jang Dong-soo kill the boss of other criminal gang, because that guy piss him off. Then Jang Dong-soo forged the evidence let people think it was K killing the boss. When K find out, he tells the truth to the thugs of that boss. So those thugs decided to kill Jang Dong-soo. They burst into the room while Jung Tae-seok and Jang Dong-soo sitting together checking K’s car, so they are forced to fight together. This fight improved their relationship.

5. Find: They found K’s fingerprint from his car, then they get the home address of K. They try to catch him.

6. Take: Jang Dong-soo catches K, he want to torture him to dead. However, Jung Tae-seok attacks Jang Dong-soo and takes K, he want K to be punished by law. But there was too little evidence for him to be sentenced. At the same time, Jang Dong-soo’s gambling stores were involved in illegal activities, leading to the arrest of all his men. Jung Tae-seok comes back for Jang Dong-soo ask him to turn himself in and testify in court.

7. Return: Jung Tae-seok shifted Jang Dong-soo’s guilt to his dead underlings and promised to reduce his punishment under the law. Jang Dong-soo wishes Jung Tae-seok could put him and K in the same prison.

8. Change: Jung Tae-seok completes his mission, K and Jang Dong-soo and all his men are locked in the same prison, so Jang Dong-soo can start his revenge in the jail.

Therefore, K is the pure villain. The cop Jung Tae-seok’s archetype is Hero, the protagonist, even though the things he did were not like a hero should do. The gangster Jang Dong-soo can be the villain, the shapeshifter or even the allies. He is a bad guy, but he has a cooperative relationship with the protagonist.

visual metaphor in film : analogical juxtaposition is an idea, a feeling or a story represented in an object. like horcrux

What is the meaning of visual culture? I will separate it as two words, ‘visual study’ and ‘ culture study’. Visual study means the visual forms like drawing, comic, advertisement, movie, animation or a video. Culture study involve many subjects like Sociology, anthropology, biology and art history, etc. Then put visual study and culture study into one word, Visual culture study, which means using different forms of visual carrier to study or express the culture instead of only using words on the books.

In this blog, I will use different aspects to explain how they can express and describe the culture on a visual production, especially the movie.

1: Mise-en-scene

Mise en scène is the arrangement of scenery and stage properties in a play. Translated from French, it means “setting the stage” but, in film analysis, the term Mise-en-scene refers to everything in front of the camera, including the set design, lighting, and actors. A good example from Boogie Nights. It’s a opening scene, the light sign, the car, people’s dress style, the way of people talking and acting, the stage, they all make the atmosphere of the night life in the last 70s. And it is a long take shot, very impressive.

2: Visual metaphor

Visual metaphor also known as Analogical juxtaposition, it is an idea, a feeling or a story represented in an object, it’s kind of like Horcrux. Except you don’t put yourself in the object, you put a concept in your object. A very good example from American Graffiti, Richard has graduated from high school, he friend and him are at a school dance, but he has step out of the dance and think. He tried to open the locker but it didn’t work. The locker is that object, it represents his past life. As he continues walking, he smiled, and now we know that he was amusing that he even tried to open his locker is the first place, he realized the past is over and there really is no going back. These are beautiful and seemingly ideas being communicating very simply and effectively with no dialogue.

3: Aesthetic of colour

The influence of color is not only in the color itself, but also in people’s association with the picture, as well as the emotional expression and psychological state reflected behind the color. As one of the important components of film art, color aesthetics is the most appealing visual language, which brings reality into fantasy and enriches the aesthetic and expression in the film.

4. Rhythm

The rhythm in the movie is normally include the rhythm of narrative, performance, sound and editing. The rhythm of narrative is reflected in the change of the story. If the story is daily life and pays attention to details without any change, it is slow. What is not daily, full of contradictions, unknown and change, is fast. For examples affectional movies have slow rhythm of narrative, but Si-fi and action movies is fast. The rhythm of performance means the movement of characters or objects have different rhythm on the scene.

The rhythm of the sound also is easy to understand, the music in the action scenes are more exciting than the normal scenes. The last one, is the rhythm of editing, here i will use two example to show it. I can’t said which is good or bad, because those different types of rhythm gave different feelings to the audients, each has their own aesthetics.

Game:

The game i want to talk about is Mortal Kombat 11, it’s the most violent and bloody game I have ever played before. The whole series have very high public praise. However, the score of the newest version 11 has fall down to 2.6 from 9.2. There were some reasons on it, for an example like microtransactions. But there are some people said this is a SJW game. SJW is Social Justice Warrior, means a pejorative term for an individual who promotes socially progressive views, including feminism, civil rights, and multiculturalism. It’s also call Baizuo. In the game, a character call Jax, he is a black man soldier. In the end of story, Jax went back to the past and using his power to eliminate all slavery from human history, creating a utopian society. But detractors say that this is SJW because apparently having a black character erase the most horrific parts of human history is not a good thing. And they even complain about the women character are covered up, they are not dressing tight and skimpy outfit like the previous MK game, they are not sexy anymore. The funny thing is most male character in game are shirtless. All those things are saying this game is SJW or too political correctness, but personally, I think it’s ok. Jax has big ambitions and it’s natural to have the ability to do something like this. The way the female characters dress doesn’t affect the way the game is played, so I don’t think it matters. Moreover, these two arguments are only the small parts of the game. Although some political parts are designed, they are only exaggerated by some extreme people, which does not affect the game experience. By the way, the game is fun.

Film:

There is a film I really want to talk about is Mulan, it’s a new Disney live-action movie in this year. But people have heard a bad news before the movie released, which was general Li Shang is no longer showing in Mulan movie. General Li Shang is a key character that can push the story forward in cartoon version, but why they deleted him on the movie version? Reed gave us the answer, he said #MeToo movement as an influence on their decision to rework the character. “I think particularly in the time of the #MeToo movement, having a commanding officer that is also the sexual love interest was very uncomfortable and we didn’t think it was appropriate.” Well, so they split Li Shang into two characters. One became Commander Tung who serves as her surrogate father and mentor in the course of the movie. The other is Honghui who is Mulan’s equal in the squad.” I think that was the other SJW decision. The result is obvious, the score of Mulan is 4.9, that is really a low score for a movie.

TV

My favorite TV show is The Rap Of China, it’s a rap talent TV show, and it had 4 seasons since 2017. On the first season, is intense and exciting, with plenty of rivalry between the contestants. It was the first Rap TV show in China, it has brought a lot of people’s attention to hip-hop.

But then there is the problem that the dark history of many rappers is becoming known to the public. A lot of people have been involved in bad behavior, such as drug use, getting into street fights and going whoring, and many of them have been turned over a new leaf but that history can’t be hidden. Obviously all those things above are illegal, so some rappers are banned in entertainment industry, and many of their songs are not allow to shows on Chinese music platform. Rap TV shows can be remained, but the government said the bad words, tattoos can’t be shown on the show. So from the second season the whole TV shows became ‘Peace and love’ and some rappers with tattoo wearing the winter suit on summer, and some lyrics are changed, for example a rapper was sing ‘walking dead’ but the subtitles turned it into ‘woken day’. It’s ridiculous. I understand the government’s policy, it’s good for protecting the young kids, ‘peace and love’ is also a part of Hiphop spirit, but for our adults, that was so boring to watch.

Advertising

This is an American advertisement in late 19 century called The Magic Washer. It shows an American wearing a American flag suit, carrying a ‘Magic Washer’, kicking a Chinese guy away who has a braid, he is a typical Chinese labor. There are some words by the side: Don’t use it if you want to be dirty.

This reflected the impression of a large number of Americans at that time on the Chinese: they were engaged in the low-end work like the laundry room and done several people at the same time, which took away the jobs of Americans. At that time, the Chinese laborers suffered all kinds of ridicule. In 1882, America has passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, this is the first time in the United States that a specific race has been evicted in the form of legislation. The above advertisement implies that “the magic washer ” can be as effective as the Chinese Exclusion Act in driving the Chinese out of the laundry room. That is one of the worst advertisements in the world, extremely disgusting.

This week we also watched BBC Paul Merton’s Weird and Wonderful World of Early Cinema, it shows the development of the film in the late 19th century, how the film technology was invented and how the film was connected to the arts.

1872 Edward Muybridge filmed 24 photos of horses running, and made them as moving image.

1888 Louis Prince filmed Roundhay Garden Scene, more earlier than Edison and Lumiere brothers. But he was disappear on a train in 1890.

1891  Thomas Edison had perfected the Kinetoscope   

1892  Emile reynaud projected the first animated film on praxinoscope

1895  Lumiere brothers show the film on cinema screen. The Gate of Factory and Train Station.

1897  George Melies, he is the father of motion picture special effects. He built the world’s first film studio, and invented many filming techniques, such as multiple exposures dissolves, hand-painted colors and time-lapse. A Trip to the Moon was his famous work. He made the connection between film and art.

 1901  James williamson, Big swallow

…..

The note below, is the timeline for the history of animation.

1609 The Magic Lantern

1800 A toy with picture on each side, flip it and give you the illusion of 2 images merged as one, that was the first actual animation.

1834 Zoetrope.

1900 Humorous Phases and Funny Faces. The first animation film.

1914 Gertie the Dinosaur, The first character animation.

1928 Steamboat Willie, the first show of Mickey mouse, also it was the first used music in animation.

1935 King Kong

1937 Snow White , it was animated by refencing human movement, and was filmed by multi depth camera.

Following by the development of the film and animation, the CGI technology was also became more and more mature.

1933 King Kong was brought to life by stop motion.

1958 The 7th Voyage of Sinbad

1963 The skeleton battle scenes in Jason and the Agonauts created by Harryhauson.

1985 Young SHERLOCK HOLMES–The first photo real computer-generated character was shown on the screen.

1989 The 75 second screen time of the liquid water tentacle we shown in The Abyss.

1991 The liquid metal cyborg in Terminator 2.

1993 Jurassic Park– The dinosaurs were complete with skeleton and textured skin and detailed muscle.

1995 ILM created the first computer animated title character in the film, Casper.

Toy story by PIXAR. The first feature-length film made entirely my computer animation.

1996 Dragon Heart.

2001 Final Fantasy, created by Square pictures as the first hyper-real computer-generated feature film based on original design.

2002 Lord of the rings: two towers

2003 The matrix Reloaded

2005 Kingkong, motion capture

2006 POTC: Dead man’s chest

2007 Beowulf

2008 Benjamin Button, a man age backward. The face of the actor was scanned and digitally aged with the help of movas contour technology. His movement was analyzed and transferred to the digital head.

2009 Avatar

We watched a video essay series this week on Youtube called How to speak to movie.

Part1 is talking about the camera, the author uses length, angle, lenses and the movement to explain the significance of the camera, how it works and what meaning that the camera give into the scenes.

Part2 is Mise en Scène, it’s a French sentence means Placing on stage. It’s the stage design and arrangement of actors in scenes for a theatre or film production. It’s including decor, lightig, colour and space. Those elements together make the scenes.

Part3 is about editing. Editing is decompose and assemble a large number of materials in the production of the film, and finally completed a coherent and fluent work. It’s process of recreation to a film instead of simply placing everything you have shot.