Why do you feel that foreign special effects are more real than domestic ones?

Because the money for special effects has been hacked.

Because we all live in the reality of China, no matter how well the special effects are done, we also know that they are fake, while foreign countries all exist in imagination, and no matter how bad the special effects are, they can be consistent with our own imagination.

From the perspective of technology and attitude.

Technical angle

All computer special effects companies in the world, including domestic and Hollywood. The software used is nothing more than 3DMAX, MAYA, C4D, AE, etc. It is downloaded on the Internet and can be purchased by ordinary people at any time. If you pay a little attention to the later period or tidbits of Hollywood blockbusters, you can see the traces of the above software.

But what's the difference between Hollywood's top special effects companies and domestic or other second-and third-tier companies?

It is divided into three aspects:

First: powerful high-tech plug-ins.

The above software can be downloaded and installed by ordinary people at any time, and they can quickly master the method of making special effects. What do you watch more on YouTube? It is very popular with foreign folklore experts. Wechat uploaded some popular special effects videos, and this kind of software is also in use.

But the production quality is far from the top special effects companies.

Wait, why is there such a big distance?

Does everyone use this software?

The answer is plug-ins.

Plug-in is to develop some quick effects on the basis of some software. For example, the one-click whitening plug-in in PS means that you can add your own photos, and the whitening effect can be achieved by one click of the plug-in. If there is no plug-in, you should adjust it slowly. The result is the same, that is, the plug-in is efficient and can be completed in a few seconds. Self-tuning is very slow, maybe tens of minutes or hours.

Top special effects companies have developed their own plug-ins on these mainstream software. These plug-ins are basically highly confidential, and the technical information you can find or learn is very limited.

I know a little about my working relationship and my love for movies.

This kind of plug-in can be divided into physical effect, dust effect, nursing effect, material texture and so on.

Suppose it took you half a year to learn MAYA and 3DMAX through professional study, and you also know how to make special effects of Iron Man yourself. However, you will find that the Iron Man you made and the Iron Man made by Marvel Comics are not realistic enough. The reason is that the dust effect (such as when Iron Man landed), the reflection of Iron Man's armor, the metallic texture of Iron Man's armor, and the trajectory of characters' movements can't achieve high fidelity.

The following is an Iron Man video made by a foreign master special effects netizen, which is already the highest level among the people. All you have to do is follow the name,

You will find that it is still very different from Marvel comics, because individuals lack such plug-ins. It can't be realistic in four aspects: dust, light, physics, materials and character movements.

Here, the most difficult texture effect at present is the simulation of fabric texture and water body.

Before 20 18 and 1 month, the strongest special effects on the earth were Justice League and Avengers League 3, but when the illusion and Superman flew inside, the cloak effect had a strong CG flavor, which can be seen as fake.

The water body is even worse, and Hollywood has been rumored to try not to touch the water. Do you find that you can't give an example of a scene in atrix? There are a lot of land wars ... Marvel comics have shot more than a dozen superheroes. Is there a water war?

Before that, the best part of "Pacific Rim" can only be the night when the sea fights monsters, and it can only be the night. ....

Again, these plug-ins are the most advanced commercial technologies and secrets at present, and there are only so many estimates that can be explained. Ask technical details again, few people on the earth can answer them completely, so I won't say it. In short, you don't have these plug-ins, and you can't buy them with money.

If all these plug-ins of Marvel Comics are given to you, can you make Iron Man as lifelike as Marvel Comics?

The answer is yes, but you can't spare the time When Iron Man is as realistic as Marvel comics, even if you have a top-notch I9 processor at home, it will take you years or even more to complete the production. Because, you can't afford to spend time rendering.

Second, the super-long invincible rendering time.

What is rendering time? Rendering time refers to the process that needs to be output as a video file when completing this special effect in the above software. This process is usually very long. First, watch a piece of news.

The latest Disney animation, Dream Ring Travel Notes, and the highest special effects scene need 125 hours to complete! According to the usual movie 30 frames per second, it takes 3750 hours to complete the animation in one second! It takes one second to complete 156 days. In the travel notes of Dream Ring, this scene appeared for about 5-6 seconds, and then it took 780 days (more than 2 years) to complete.

Two years passed in a few seconds, and so on ~ Isn't this film production cycle 10 years and 8 years?

Theoretically, this calculation method is generally based on the most advanced, single, and once again the rendering time of a single computer, which is used to objectively express the technical difficulty.

But they own a rendering farm.

The so-called rendering farm can be simply understood as a super super supercomputer composed of hundreds of servers. Simply put, your computer 10 has 20 cores, and the others are like thousands of cores and millions of cores.

In this case, the rendering time is generally reduced to tens of minutes, and it can be completed in a second for several hours, while it takes only a few weeks to complete top special effects films such as Dream Journey and The Avengers.

At the beginning of 2000, Sita Digital (also translated as Vita Digital) was responsible for rendering the special effects of the The Lord of the Rings series with the strongest special effects that year. Because there are too many chipsets in the rendering field, the heat output is too high. The Lord of the Rings's special effects won't appear until winter. Why, it's cold enough! In summer, cooling equipment is very expensive ... so natural cooling in winter can save money, boss.

This is a The Lord of the Rings film, which is introduced in the DVD collection. Are you interested in seeing it?

Building a rendering farm, the price is of course sky-high. Take the fastest I9 as an example, the price is close to 1. 1 10,000 chips ... It is not surprising to build a rendering farm, and the price ranges from tens of millions to hundreds of millions.

Well, even if Brother Sicong pays and spends hundreds of millions on a rendering farm, where are the talents?

Third: a strong scientific team.

Well, you have plug-ins and the rendering farm has spent money on them. You came out as Iron Man, punched the wall, the wall was rotten, and the fragments flew about! Not realistic enough!

What is the force feedback effect of Iron Man hitting the wall with one punch? Can't it be like through the air?

Does the flying speed of debris conform to the physical laws? Almost, like cotton. Slow, like metal.

What shape is reasonable for the flying dust mass of dust? What is a reasonable size?

The bricks on the wall are rotten. Does the ground conform to the physical effect? Did the brick rebound when it fell to the ground? How high is the rebound reasonable?

All these require a strong scientific team, through simulation calculation, and then adjust it to feel real.

In 2000, Disney produced a 3D animation "Dinosaur", and began to feel that the running and movement of dinosaurs were not realistic enough. Do the main muscles in the later stage. When dinosaurs were moving, the main muscle groups of the body should also change accordingly to simulate the real animal movement, which requires the guidance of some experts in animal body structure and muscle. I forgot the details. The DVD tidbits have such an introduction.

Interstellar of Nolan invited top physicists to study the black hole effect, and how to express the black hole intuitively is reasonable. ......

Well, after spending so much saliva, we are talking about hardware technology, the difference between us and Hollywood.

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Attitude towards production

The first investor affects the quality of production.

At present, the development of domestic films is a super hot investment direction. From Goodbye Mr. Loser in the early years to Wolf Warrior 2 this year, the return on investment 10 times or even dozens of times, which triggered the investment myth. At present, few formal investment returns in China can reach this ratio in 1-2 years!

Everyone knows that hot money is pouring into film and television investment. When we invested in the film industry, there was a gap of nearly 100 years with Hollywood standard industrialization.

China's film industry also has a long history. The film industry is, but the commercialization of standards began with Zhang Yimou's Hero 200 1. The previous films were all produced by X Studio under the state, which is no different from news broadcast, with state investment and state recycling. Hero is the beginning of a formal commercial operation. The boss invests and is responsible for its own profits and losses. It's only 17 years now!

Investment in the domestic film industry is basically abnormal. The voice of investors is very loud, not producers. Hollywood, on the other hand, is not a mature industrial system. The producers have taken quality as the premise, and the appropriate directors, actors and scripts are all executed under the authorization of the producers. There is a classic joke in Hollywood. 1968 stanley kubrick produced A Space Odyssey 200 1, which took a long time to produce. Investors have to write and ask, "Is 200 1 the title or the date of issue?" . You can see how powerful the director is from the side.

Not in China now. The boss tells you who he wants to direct and who will star. I don't know how many bad movies are starred by flow stars or stars kept by bosses. This kind of "amateurs lead experts" and "ass-sitting position determines output" is in China.

In this way, the quality of film and television production is very different. This rarely happens in Hollywood. Even if the film content is bad, people's photography, post-production and sound effects will still maintain a super high standard. Recently, the Justice League has been rotten, and the story has been rotten. Technically speaking, people's special effects, sound, photography, lighting, art design, post-production, lens splitting and editing are all at the highest level at present.

Second, funds are tight.

The technology has been made clear above. Of course, these can be burned by burning money.

But the problem is that domestic films are basically limited to domestic release, and the quality of our films has not yet reached the global level. In China, the box office of1-200 million has reached its peak. (Wolf Warrior is a special case, so you can't refer to it.)

I will give you a list. Today, the box office of domestic movies has exceeded 2 billion.

Wolf warrior 25.6 billion.

Mermaid 3.4 billion

Monsters hunt 2.4 billion.

Shameful iron fist 2.2 billion

(It seems that the top 3 has been surpassed today, but it has not been drawn yet, so it can't be counted. )

So far, only four domestic films have exceeded 2 billion!

In the form of box office accounts, 40-45% of investors, 40-45% of cinemas (cinemas), and the remaining 10% have any film development funds and taxes.

In other words, investors got back about 90- 1 100 million of the 2 billion box office. Suppose the film production cost is 400 million, the publicity cost is 200 million, and the cost is already 600 million. Pay the tax. The return of actual investors is about 200-300 million.

In short, the investment cost X 4 = no loss!

Okay, get a return on investment?

If you were the boss and invested in a movie, you wouldn't dream of 45 billion, would you? To be conservative, the budget is1.5-200 million box office. Converted, the investment cannot exceed 500 million.

500 million yuan, converted into dollars, is less than 80 million dollars. Do you know how much the Women's Federation 3 is investing now? 500 million dollars, equivalent to more than 3 billion yuan!

You got it? The production cost limits the investment in hardware such as special effects, post-production and art design. The quality of production can't be compared with Hollywood investment at all!

The third kind of abnormal market and production attitude

At the cost of 500 million yuan, the pay for small fresh meat has been halved, leaving only 200 million film quality, which is tens of millions of dollars. .....

Boss, hurry up and invest now. 20 18 was released in the summer vacation, and the production cycle was only half a year, until the Spring Festival of 20 19, which was only one year. Want to shoot dinosaurs like Disney? Even every muscle and bone is lifelike? Don't dream, your dinosaur just graduated from college and painted like a small one! What, no overtime? A raise? Substitution!

Isn't it because of money?

It is said that foreign countries, such as Hollywood, spend 200 million yuan to make a movie and shoot props and special effects, basically more than 100 million yuan, and the pay of those big-name stars may not be sky-high

I also heard that it costs China 200 million yuan to make a film, of which1.500 million is the actor's salary. The funds are divided into clothing and special effects, which may be only a few hundred thousand or even less.

The cost is hundreds of thousands or even less. How do the special effects made by this money compare with those made by others who spent 100 million yuan? If it doesn't look fake, didn't people spend a hundred million dollars in vain?

What's more, I heard that the special effects of many movies are outsourced layer by layer.

The producer handed over the work of making special effects to company A, which divided the special effects of this film into several parts and subcontracted them to companies B, C, D, E and F respectively. Although it is the same movie, the people who do special effects have never touched it, and they all do it according to their own feelings and personal understanding. When all the special effects were finally assembled and edited, it was found that the special effects styles made by each company were different and could not be integrated, so they were not fakes at first glance.

In addition, it is said that people who do these special effects are not necessarily masters.

The producer handed over the work of making special effects to company A; Company A took 300,000 yuan, kept 6.5438+0.5 million yuan, and gave the job to Company B, 6.5438+0.5 million yuan; Company B reserved 654.38 million yuan for itself and gave the job to a school teacher with 50,000 yuan. The teacher left 40 thousand yuan and gave the work to his students with 1 000 yuan. The student left 8000 yuan and gave the job to the children who were learning to make pictures in the internet cafe with 2000 yuan. The children are so beautiful that their noses are bubbling.

It needs money to do this, but there is not enough money; It is necessary to engage in technology and poor production technology. Then tell me, what other good special effects can you make?

One more question. Even if the production funds are sufficient and the personnel who produce special effects are all experts, he can't stand the confusion of laymen.

What are the special effects personnel abroad? We have also seen some documentaries, and no one came to mix when they were doing special effects. Even if the chief producer comes and wants to point fingers at these professional jobs, the staff will send him a sentence: get out!

Domestic, even worse. Both producers and directors are amateurs. The layman is bleeding and watching the staff do special effects. He gives you blind guidance, and the layman guides the expert. Every time he is bound, he is tortured. If you don't believe me, go online and see how many front-line personnel go to work with kitchen knives every day, and they may struggle with Party A at any time. With such a Party A, no matter how competent the staff is, he can't exert his strength. Can special effects be done well?

This problem does exist. I have seen many movies and found a problem. It is the problem of background rendering. When foreign blockbusters arrive at the background of special effects, they are all very dark colors, which makes the special effects consistent and seamless. It's different in China, and the special effects feel exaggerated.

The money is not in place, and the right tour costs an average of $6 million. The grand occasion cost 8 million-10/00000 USD.

Distribution is not in place, domestic traffic accounts for the majority, how can we buy good quality with a few cents left?

There is also aesthetics. Look at the light played by all friends, and look at the light played by most Chinese dramas and Xian Xia dramas.

Not to mention color matching, low-level.

I remember a few years ago, there was a saying, "China plays are afraid that you don't know whether it is fake or not, and American plays are afraid that you will see that it is fake."

On the other hand, China opera is growing slowly, and with the growth of the younger generation, Chinese people are also growing aesthetically.

Still a technical problem.

The budget is limited and the investment direction is different. One pays attention to content, and the other pays attention to human nature.

I feel dizzy when I watch the Spring Festival Gala.

Without boasting or belittling, some special effects of foreign blockbusters really left a few streets in China. Personally, I think the special effects of the Lord of the Rings trilogy are really classic, and even the current domestic movies can't catch up with flattery. The reasons are nothing more than the following. First, the technology is not good, and the domestic film special effects technology is really inferior to others. Second, because of habits, domestic commercial films pursue traffic, that is, relying on traffic stars to support the layout. So special effects are not that difficult. Third, the problem of funds, a movie invested so much, the stars took most of it, and it would be nice to have a few special effects. Unlike Hollywood, if your stars charge a high price, they won't need you and train you directly.