CGI

Photorealistic renderings of architectural designs are now pervasive in media of every kind and regarded as indispensable in the world of architecture at every level. They occupy a space between architecture and photography whose mixing of virtual and real, production and reproduction , entails a series of implicit premises and results that are generally taken for granted, conveying a markedly spectacular vision of the city and of architecture. After discussing the reasons for the growing use of photorealism in architecture, the paper presents and analyzes the main categories of photorealistic renderings and their recurrent characteristics, with the aim of showing how the most evident aspects of these images correspond to a range of tendencies in contemporary architecture. The essay, in addition, puts forward some reflections on the relationship between photorealistic renderings and architecture, the reality of construction and society.

El videoclip como formato audiovisual publicitario suele ser sinónimo de efectismos, intertextualidad y marcos visuales complejos, funciones para las que sin duda se sirve de toda la vanguardia tecnológica de la que pueda disponer. Este artículo trata de analizar qué ventajas encuentra en la integración de modelos 3D animados para el desarrollo de mundos irreales como parte de su puesta en escena. Desde los primeros casos hasta la actualidad, se presenta una serie de ejemplos que sirven como muestra cronológica de la evolución de la animación 3D integrada en videoclip para concluir finalmente en sus aportaciones vinculadas a la relación escenografía/narración y a su idoneidad como nexo de unión con los marcos referenciales usados en el formato cinematográfico.

L'expression "illusion de la vie" qui donne son titre à ce mémoire est empruntée à Frank Thomas et Ollie Johnston, auteurs de l'ouvrage The Illusion of life. Elle est fréquemment utilisée pour décrire le mode sur lequel les personnages d'animation opèrent. Les deux animateurs relatent dans ce livre leur expérience au sein des studios Disney et livrent l'idéologie au cœur de leurs productions. Cette dernière suppose qu'une animation doit restituer les mouvements d'un personnage de manière suffisamment crédible pour donner au spectateur le sentiment qu'il mène une existence autonome, et susciter en lui une forme d'émerveillement. Les personnages d'animation, selon cette mythologie, auraient une vie qui se poursuivrait en coulisses, commel'illustre pertinemment Who Framed Roger Rabbit ? (1988) dans lequel les personnages de cartoons cohabitent avec les humains et sont acteurs de leurs films.

Quant au qualificatif de virtuel, il ne fait pas exclusivement référence à sa nature numérique, il renvoie également au sens philosophique de ce terme. Le terme virtuel s'oppose à celui d'actuel, il s'agit d'une chose qui existe sans se manifester dans la réalité. Nous l'utilisons ici pour insister sur la condition à la fois immatérielle et fictionnelle du personnage numérique. Ce dernier-né de l'animation a connu un formidable essor, ce qui nous pousse à nous interroger sur les particularismes de son esthétique et de son champ d'action. En quoi l’outil numérique offre-t-il de nouvelles perspectives à la représentation de personnages animés?

Pour répondre à cette question, nous commencerons par nous familiariser avec les caractéristiques du personnage d'animation, sa nature et ses desseins, quelques soit la technique utilisée pour le matérialiser. Puis, nous concentrerons plus particulièrement notre attention sur l'image numérique, ses spécificités, et son retentissement sur le processus de création de personnages animés. Nous conduirons pour terminer le personnage à la rencontre du spectateur et réfléchirons à la manière dont leur interaction a pu faire émerger de nouvelles formes d'art.

This paper offers a historical inquiry into industry worries about incredulous viewers, prompted by the persistence of claims by prominent contemporary film industry figures that computer-generated imagery (CGI) is intrinsically detrimental to cinematic realism and is eroding viewer immersion in screen fiction. Examining a range of fan and trade magazines from the 1910s and 1920s, I find evidence of an earlier anxiety in the film industry about incredulous viewers. This anxiety, however, was blamed not on the intrinsic unreality of cinematic tricks but a broader film culture, including fake actuality films and journalistic revelations of filmmaking secrets. I show that the industry made a concerted effort to manage such viewership by cultivating uncertainty about the reality or artifice of what appeared on the screen. Finally, moving back to the present, I argue that CGI is not inherently less real. Rather, a broader viewing culture of incredulity has reemerged due to a combination of production publicity, cult viewing of bad cinema, online forums, editorial photoshopping, and image hoaxes.

Computer Graphics or Computer Generated Imagery or CGI is a sub-field of Computer Science. CGI produces fascinating and jaw dropping results. At times CGI diminishes the thin line between reality and vitality , as it gets difficult to identify the original from CGI. The jaw dropping effects however require a lot of efforts and follow a strict process and procedure. This paper tries to broadly explain the process and procedure commonly known as pipeline of CGI.

The World War II combat films made in Hollywood in the late 1990s and early 2000s demonstrate nostalgia for the celluloid-based, documentary-inspired techniques of the 1940s, while at the same time reveling in the possibilities of computer-generated imagery.  This potential contradiction converges on the body of the American soldier, whose physical suffering is illustrated with a combination of optical, photochemical, and digital means. This essay argues that the violence inflicted on the American soldier’s body operates along a melodramatic logic that ultimately redeems the soldier from perceived transgressions in Vietnam and the War on Terror.The World War II combat films made in Hollywood in the late 1990s and early 2000s demonstrate nostalgia for the celluloid-based, documentary-inspired techniques of the 1940s, while at the same time reveling in the possibilities of computer-generated imagery.  This potential contradiction converges on the body of the American soldier, whose physical suffering is illustrated with a combination of optical, photochemical, and digital means. This essay argues that the violence inflicted on the American soldier’s body operates along a melodramatic logic that ultimately redeems the soldier from perceived transgressions in Vietnam and the War on Terror.

Dudley Andrew contends that “if a novel’s story is judged in some way comparable to its filmic adaptation, then the strictly separate but equivalent processes of implication which produced the narrative units of that story through words and audio-visual signs, respectively, must be studied” (Film Theory 103). This semiotic approach has been recognized as an important adaptation studies tool by a number of scholars (Stam “Beyond Fidelity” 62; Griffith 28). Cohen applied this method in his analysis of Dick Tracy, summarizing, “The ‘comic aesthetic’ in Dick Tracy does not transcend the ontology of cinema; it is an aesthetic translation of the characteristics and conventions from the comic medium by using the stylistic and functional equivalents in cinema” (36). Building on this observation, this chapter will seek to identify equivalences between the forms, mapping where they have been utilized by filmmakers to achieve a comic aesthetic.

Abstract
The new “Joker” movie, directed by Todd Phillips, was released in 2019 and brought a range of fervent and controversial discussion both in critics and audiences. Nevertheless, the “Joker” persona is tightly associated with comics and the superhero movie genre, and usually depicted in a particular way. However, the new movie differs in vital points. This study aims to explore the differences that lie between the “Joker”, and his depiction in the superhero genre. In order to investigate this inquiry, we conducted an exploratory research, and used latent content analysis. From our results, we extrapolate that the new movie constructs a more humane and approachable image of the “Joker”, as opposed to the “nameless” and “cold-blooded” villain. Simultaneously, we concluded that the movie adopts a more realistic and less entertaining approach towards violence, a prominent characteristic in superhero movies.
Keywords: Joker, Arthur Fleck, killer clown, media ecology, superhero genre, supervillain, CGI, advanced technology, content analysis, violence.

Photorealistic renderings of architectural designs are now pervasive in media of every kind and regarded as indispensable in the world of architecture at every level. They occupy a space between architecture and photography whose mixing of virtual and real, production and reproduction , entails a series of implicit premises and results that are generally taken for granted, conveying a markedly spectacular vision of the city and of architecture. After discussing the reasons for the growing use of photorealism in architecture, the paper presents and analyzes the main categories of photorealistic renderings and their recurrent characteristics, with the aim of showing how the most evident aspects of these images correspond to a range of tendencies in contemporary architecture. The essay, in addition, puts forward some reflections on the relationship between photorealistic renderings and architecture, the reality of construction and society.

This thesis aims to study the usage of computer generated imagery in VJ
Performance. The main workflow of VJ Practices has been divided into content, process, and output. The project includes the creation of computer generated visual material via generative/creative coding defined as content, VJ performance with these materials defined as process, and presentation of visuals via Video Projection Mapping Technology defined as output.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest no sólo fue un
gran entretenimiento. Detrás de este gran éxito del 2006 hay
mucha tela para cortar: Desde su apego a la tradición del cine
de piratas hasta su lógica de videojuego, las aventuras de
Jack Sparrow merecen revisarse más allá del simple
blockbuster que muchos críticos quisieron ver.

This paper overviews existing plausibility measures of 3D narrative animations with a focus on analyzing the realism of 3D characters and their performances. The main intent of this survey is to critically review factors that affect an overall perceptual sense of realism. Media literature addressing formal realism is connected to the technical facets of the 3D practice. This theoretical-technical bridge creates a case study database, from which a novel graphical system called The Character Plausibility Graph is proposed. The Character Plausibility Graph acts as an expanded edition of the well-known Uncanny Valley diagram, and depicts the relative effects of different formal visual elements on the character' sense of plausibility. The proposed graph is a dissection of a 3D character into its static and kinetic components and hence provides a visual tool to reflect upon the effects individually. This research concludes that stylization better serves the overall sense of plausibility than mere photo-realism or naturalism. It also reveals that performance of the characters and their animating method play a more significant role in the constitution of their realism, than their static design and rendering style.

Digitale Figuren, die durch computergenerierte Bewegtbilder (Computer Generated Imagery, CGI) dargestellt werden, haben sich inzwischen in den meisten Bereichen der audiovisuellen Produktion verbreitet: Sie finden sich in Computerspielen und virtuellen Welten ebenso wie in vielen Kinofilmen und Fernsehproduktionen. Auch werden sie zunehmend als Teil transmedialer Unterhaltungs-Franchises und Werbekampagnen angelegt.  Die Entwicklung digitaler Figuren hängt dabei mit der Entwicklung neuer Medien zusammen: Die Figuren in Computerspielen sind notwendigerweise digital konstruiert. Dagegen wurden Filmfiguren bis vor wenigen Jahrzehnten bekanntlich entweder durch gefilmte Schauspieler (Real- oder Live-Action-Film) oder durch klassische Animationstechniken (Trick- oder Animationsfilm) dargestellt. Die Digitaltechnik bot hier großes Potenzial: freie Gestaltbarkeit der Figuren, Spektakularität, ökonomische Vorteile, vereinfachte Produktionsabläufe, leichte Vervielfältigung und transmediale Übertragbarkeit. Man muss keinen mediengeschichtlichen Technik-Determinismus vertreten, um festzustellen, dass die Digitalisierung der Medienproduktion das Angebot medialer Figuren innerhalb der letzten 30 Jahre tiefgreifend verändert hat.

Celebrities have never been as reachable as in social media; a comprehensive,
global platform, not bounded with time and space. The rise of social media with web 2.0 was a natural consequence of the evolving technologies that enabled the users to ‘write back into the text’ and become an active producer of content for the web.Today, literally anyone can become famous in an instant with one well designed viral. This technical potentiality of the web also embraces the risk of unexpected profanity, desecration and public humiliation for both the prosumer who also has an ‘influencer’ potential in the online world and the celebrity as the influencer. Since the beginning of mass media, famous people faced societal demands which mostly lasted in loss
of their privacy, and ‘tolerated’ immorality. However today, with the advances in technology and the internet, they share these attributes with their ‘infamous’ followers; who also have the chance to become celebrities overnight as a return of their prosumer identities. At these cyber times, as the ‘authority’ aspect of Cialdini’s persuasion techniques is re-shaping, the challenges which will be brought along with
it may constitute a significant shift in advertising. Jhally and Livant (1986:124), state that in times of New Media, consumers work by watching advertisements and are compensated for this work with content and services. This analysis inevitably challenges the common perception of social media platforms to be regarded as ‘freebies’. Andrejevic,(2002:230), adds another dimension to the previously mentioned statement and argues that new media technologies profit by encouraging consumers to perform the work of being watched. At this point, some questions come to mind:Which challenges will advertisers face in regards to using celebrities for selling products when the ‘watcher’ and ‘the watched one’are the same? How will the shift in ‘authority’ (from know-how to experience) change the celebrity influence in advertising? These questions will be analysed by using content and discourse analysis in this study.

Although it has been extremely successful at the box office, James Cameron’s sf epic Avatar has also been criticized for its lack of originality and its predictable story. In my paper I argue that this kind of disappointment is not so much a consequence of the movie’s plot but of formal aspects. Like in all sf, Avatar’s impact relies heavily on the interaction between naturalization and estrangement. On a formal level sf always na- turalizes its nova, it makes the alien look ordinary by employing an aesthetics of tech- nology. Estrangement, on the other hand, happens on a diegetic level, inside the story world, when a (naturalized) marvelous element is introduced into an apparently realis- tic world and causes frictions between the orders of these two worlds. This mecha- nism is partly suspended when it comes to Avatar’s most important novum: the digi- tally created Na’vi. Relying on the research by Barbara Flückiger, I show how Avatar is so concerned with properly naturalizing the Na’vi and not letting them appear as too strange, that most of its potential for estranging effects goes unused.

That the whole planet has seen little Korean cinema is undeniable and that this series is not full of them is equally indemonstrable, so being surprised a little for the treatment of a script that leaks from all sides is fully legitimate. However, those who chew oriental cinema a little in the nine proposed episodes know well that once the ritual practices have been carried out, everything will result in a kind of soap opera made up of extremely stereotyped characters who even declare their own psychology and everything ...

Inception of The Plasma-Image: A Case Study of The Peter Rubin Collection @ EYE Filmmuseum //

This case study presents the career history and artistic philosophy of experimental filmmaker and Video Jockey (VJ) Peter Rubin. It is argued that documentation of Rubin’s career and life work, currently held at the Eye Filmmuseum Collections Center, illustrates a unique new media archeological perspective towards the philosophy of abstraction in the movement-image. Namely, the evolution of Rubin’s artistic philosophy throughout his transition from experimental film to VJ elucidates structural transformations concerning power and socio-cultural dynamics throughout the evolutionary shifts in audiovisual moving-image media formats. Furthermore, it is argued that abstract audiovisual artists are able to break down and illustrate contemporary power structures, socio-cultural structures, and behavioural structures which correspond to the scientific paradigms of their time. I expand on Deleuze’s assertion of the relevance of the imperceptible intervals of movement and light as well as the psychological consequences of constructing the any-space-whatever. The thesis shows that the background influence of abstract kinetic audiovisual immersive art, which deconstructs emancipatory nature of movement, the psyche, and consciousness from the bounds of physical spatiality, has a lineage dating back to early experimental cinema. Through applying the case study of Rubin as Video Jockey, the philosophical and socio-cultural insight from this lineage can be applied to contemporary new media technologies and culture.

This article argues that Pixar's computer generated (CG) animated features of the past 15 years sit at a crossroads in both the conceptualization of viewers and their socialization to the contemporary digital screen. Embedded within a new aesthetic visual form, almost all of Pixar's movies feature, and talk back to, the emergence of the mythical astonished cinema spectator. At the same time, Pixar's features question the future of digital spectacle and the position of the screen subject. In the contemporary context of the social network and the online video, CG animated features do not simply prepare young viewers for a world of consumer behaviour, they prepare them for a multilayered world of digital screens in which they must learn to function as objects of consumption as well as consuming agents. Beyond this, however, and in contrast to previous Disney features, Pixar movies prepare young consumers for a changed production landscape in contemporary culture. Moving beyond notions of Fordist production that structured previous discourses of the viewing and socialized child, the spectacular specificity of Pixar movies is now structured self-reflexively according to the logic of the attention economy.

Miscible gas flooding using carbon dioxide provides us excellent microscopic displacement efficiency in different mature oil fields. Due to the limitation of CO2, optimization of CO2-EOR process to reach to the best macroscopic sweep efficiency is an essential problem. Unfavorable mobility ratio and gravity segregation lead to viscose fingering and gravity override. Hence, areal and vertical sweep efficiencies decrease due to the early breakthrough of the injected gas. Different approaches are applied to change the injection scenario of the gas to control the mobility ratio and gravity effects. A comprehensive approach is needed to select the best scenario and optimize it to achieve the highest recovery in an economical manner. Different scenarios of water alternating carbon dioxide injection such as TWACO2 (Tapered Water Alternating CO2), WACO2 (Water Alternating CO2), SSWACO2 (Selective Simultaneous Water and CO2), and SWACO2 (Simultaneous Water and CO2) can be selected as candidates for the EOR operation. In this work, these scenarios were simulated and studied for a non-fractured reservoir. The simulation outcomes were coupled by an economical model and compared to the pure water and CO2 injection to specify the appropriate and optimized injection method to gain to the highest Net Present Value. Hence, by this method, the necessary amount of the injected gas and water were also optimized for the best scenario. By our simulations, we found that SWACO2 injection increased the total recovery compared to the primary recovery by 25.4 percent which was the highest. The achieved NPV was lower for this method compared to TWACO2. Hence, we recommended TWACO2 as the best method and we optimized it for application in the field.

The core features that concern the automation of perception and interpretation of human motion in contemporary artificial intelligence computer vision (CV) systems are a) Anatomical; motion of body parts, b) Spatio-temporality; tracking a moving human/object from (multiple camera perspectives), and c) Sequential Memory; recognising human activities from image sequences.  This paper aims to look at these core features and how they factor into CGI history and subsequently outline the training of contemporary computer vision technologies, of which finds “relation to the philosophical question of the splitting of viewpoint, the sharing of perception of the environment between the animate
(the living subject) and the inanimate (the object, the seeing machine). Questions which introduce, de facto, the question of ‘artificial intelligence’[.]” (Virilio 1994: 59-60) Namely this paper offers a media archaeological approach towards a philosophical and technical discussion concerning the evolution of artificial intelligence’s interpretability of the digital moving-image: the evolution of A.I.’s “sight” or of computer vision via the history of computer-generated image (CGI).

In the commonly-used EOR methods such as water flooding and gas injection, high and unsuitable mobility ratio lead to viscose fingering and reduction of sweep efficiency. Early breakthrough of the injected fluid in the production wells is the major problem associated with these processes. A solution to this problem is an alternative process called water-alternating-gas (WAG). WAG injection could increase the recovery by contacting the upswept reservoir zones, especially recovery of attic or cellar oil by exploiting the segregation of gas to the top or accumulating of water towards the bottom. The WAG process has been proved beneficial in re-pressurizing the reservoir compared to a single water flooding process. This higher pressure is caused by the gas slug injection which causes extremely high voidage replacement rate because of its high mobility. WAG injection increases the efficiency of the plain gas injection, too. By alternating the gas injection with water injection, the gas relative mobility in the reservoir is reduced compared to the pure gas injection. Therefore, less gas breaks through to the producing wells, reducing gas handling requirements. Furthermore, the lower producing GOR associated with WAG injection results in less erosion of the production equipment. In this work, scenarios of water alternating carbon dioxide injection such as WACO2, HWACO2, WACO2a.WF, SWACO2, SSWACO2 and pure water and carbon dioxide injection are compared to specify the appropriate injection method. Also these scenarios in Four-spot, Dual Four-spot, Five-spot, and Dual Five-spot well patterns were compared. Results indicated that SWACO2 injection in Dual Five-spot pattern has the highest oil production and lowest residual oil saturation. Five-spot pattern had the higher recovery and lower residual oil saturation than Dual 4-spot pattern, so adding the number of wells could not raise the recovery.