Thread: CGI vs. Practical Effects...

I don't like the term CGI
The original term was CG (computer graphics)
CGI is the common gateway interface (a technical internet & networking term), and the acronym got confused with CG
("computer generated imagery" was coined after the fact)

personal preference, but I like "Digital effects"
anyway...

it really depends on how digital effects are used

For non-real (or difficult to achieve in real life) things, digital effects can be quite obvious, which may be a turn-off for people
The recent spate of super hero films sort of highlights this
(you can't realistically film a live action scene with an eight foot green giant)

However, used for the mundane, they're indistinguishable from the real thing, and will go by completely unnoticed (aside from adding realism to the film)
any action film involving people being shot, stabbed, having a leg blown off, etc. is almost always done using digital effects.

Digital effects are used everywhere (and have been for a long, long time)
it's far quicker and cheaper (not to mention more realistic) than explosive charges blowing up blood packs

The Titanic, in the 1997 film was all done digitally

http://www.linuxjournal.com/files/li...494/2494f1.png

It's a boat
but it wasn't real (did you honestly know that? - cause till I read about it, I didn't)

(as a side note, Titanic was the first blockbuster film where Linux rose to the challenge of usurping the older Unix mainframes, providing a cheaper, more scalable software effects platform - http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/2494)

So, do I think it's undeniably fake
No, not at all
however there's only so "real" you can make a completely unreal effect

CGI wins when done correctly.

Full stop.