Rather late coming into this thread, but I'm here because of the basic topic of Muppets. I have no problem with CGI and am not going to talk about one vs. the other, but I will say one of the things I have always loved about the Muppets and any of Jim Henson's projects, is they were real. They were tangible, physical things. There was no concern about how hair should be generated on a screen. I understand that CGI is, in itself, an art, but the realness of the Muppets is what always impressed, and in some cases, scared me. That's what had me totally immersed in The Dark Crystal as a child. Yes, there were matte paintings, but the creatures were real, the sets were real, you could sense texture not because of imaging tricks but because the texture was a tangible thing that existed.
Watching the Skeksis Emperor die and fall apart freaked me out as a kid, and now, as an adult, I am still impressed with how it happened. It actually did happen. An actual puppet with a performer, crumbled apart. Yes, I am aware that special effects were used in the movie, as in where a Skeksis & his Mystic counterpart vanish in a poof of light, but the sets & all the misc. background creatures were physical things.
Sorry, just got caught up in reliving Jim Henson's magic.

CGI is best when used to enhance what's already there but is not as good when used to completely replace other effects. Prosthetics, make-up, animatronics and models really add the feeling that there's something there and often stand the test of time.
Like how the T-Rex looks amazing with it's mixture of animatronics and CGI but watching the trailer for the new version the creatures look so obviously cartoonish despite being high level CGI. It's like you can see the space where they've been pasted in.
The first LOTR trilogy often utilized CGI very well (though there were obvious exceptions where things had been created entirely out of CGI). By mixing physical effects and using CGI to enhance things they managed to create a world that felt real, compare that to the Hobbit trilogy which has much better CGI technology and a shockingly higher budget but looks rather like a video game.

Completely agree (and I don't care how old this thread is; I hate overuse of CG so much!).
If CGI is used, it should be to touch-up practical effects, and
lightly
.

CGI is way overused at this point. A good example is Yoda from Empire Strikes Back verse Yoda in Revenge of the Sith. All of the charm and realism was completely lost.
Here is where I agree.

I agree totally. CGI is way overused at this point. A good example is Yoda from Empire Strikes Back verse Yoda in Revenge of the Sith. All of the charm and realism was completely lost.
Lord of the Rings was a movie that mixed CGI with matte paintings and costumes, which in my opinion was the greatest use of CGI ever on film. The Star Wars prequels was the worst example.

I agree - just look at the animals in "Jumanji". They didn't have "weight", they didn't move right or naturally. They ran past so fluidly and so lightweight as to be unbelievable. The elephant that crushed the car didn't move right, in the same way that you'd expect a real elephant to crush a car. You couldn't feel its "weight".
"I can't take his drivel anymore, Counselor, do something!"

Its so true, puppets have much more life in them. Even when a CG character was motion captured theyre pretty much soulless cartoons. You can just feel it when what youre looking at is actually there on screen, and characters cant affect you if they literally have no substance. And its the same with gore. People getting torn apart digitally is funny, but the special effects in older films like The Thing or The Fly make your limbs feel numb. And dont get me started on the new and improved ET special edition, a paraplegic in a suit can capture peoples hearts ten times better then a digital drawing.
Why do people so frequently get told to "read the book" on a
movie
database?

I'm one of those people who would rather see real world puppets/models over the CGI type any day, but to claim that CGI these days still looks fake is showing your only looking at the bad examples on those cheap sci-fi shows.
A decent CGI creation is in no way cheaper than making a puppet version, it's only because most movies try to pay the cheapest for their CGI that you get those bad fake look creations. Go onto a site like CGTalk and you will see exactly what CGI is capable of by artists that aren't restricted by a budget. The only reason puupets/models can be made to look more real than CGI is because the materials that go into their production to make them look real is far cheaper. And not to insult a lot of those artists out there but creating a realisitic looking living creature using CGI methods takes an aweful amount of skill, your talking 3D creation methoids, 2D texturing, knowing anatomy to create realistic muscle movement, so for those wanting to think CGI is the easy way out hopefully you'll begin to understand it isn't even close to being easy.
I do agree though that a lot of CGI is wasted in movies under some fake illusion that is wows the audience, just as someone mentioned the LOTR movies showed perfectly how to use CGI; Use it to create your word/inhabitants and let the story/script wow you.

I've said it once and I'll say it again: I'll take animatronic puppets and robots and actors in make up and rubber suits over CGI anyday. CGI monsters are like having a cartoon character in a live action film. My kudos to the actors for running in terror and making it look effective even though they are just standing there in front of a blank green screen. CGI is widely used because it's cheaper but you can tell the difference. I think movies from the late 1960s-mid to late 1990s made the best monsters & aliens. This was before CGI was widely used but beyond the days when you could see the zippers on the back of the monster's suit. Things looked real and you couldn't tell it was a puppet or actor. Some CGI can be effective though, particularly when mixed with puppets, actors etc. District 9 is a fine example. The aliens looked so real I assumed they were actors in costumes rather than CGI characters.

The OP couldn't be more right! Take Gmork in NeverEnding Story. I still shield my eyes as an adult. The Skeksis are as terrifyingly ugly as ever, especially the death of the emperor. I like the idea of even older films such as the Time Machine where the cannibals are wierd and freaky, and YES, their eyes can glow. If anyone has ever seen the Cannon Movie Tales series. Those have frightening imagery as found with the modern filmmaking. MOst effective to me was "Snow White" in which Diana Rigg as the evil queen has a magic mirror that talks to her by way of heads that surround the mirror. The heads have black eyes, and are quite mean looking.
There's also Tim Curry as darkness in Legend, and the Power Of Shadow in Supergirl.
With every beat of my heart, there's thunder inside

I agree, I think the best CGI monster ever was the T-Rex in Jurassic Park, especially when it breaks through the fence. That still gives me chills, and when I first saw it, I was just floored. "How did they
do
that?"
Moldy mildew, mother of mouthmuck, dangle and strangle and death!"

I generally agree, but it's mainly because I feel that CG isn't utilized as well as it could- in theory, if it's done properly, CG can be very moving and/or frightening And it has been in a number of films.
However, it seems nowadays that CG is used for "wows" rather than true impact 90% of the time.
"Give Me Immortality, Or Give Me Death"

I found the morlocks in the 2002 time machine more scary than the 1960 version

That's what they'll be doing with the Dark Crystal sequel - puppets with only CGI enhancements - such as the fire on the character of "Thurma" - the girl made of fire.
"Wings?I don't have wings!?"
"Of course not. You're a boy."

I agree with everyone on this board. CGI can be great - if used sparingly, and to enhance the effects of "traditional" imagery. The puppets in the Dark Crystal cannot be called fake by anyone - true, they are not real animals, but they are really there. CGI in todays movies are everywhere, and it doesn't make any movie memorable. Today's CGI movies - like "The Day After Tomorrow", for example - really depend on the story and acting (among other things) to make the movie good, because the viewer knows what they are watching is fake (in the sense, that obviously the filmmakers did not film this for real, but created it from nothing). Obviously, too often these movies do not even begin to raise themselves above the rest regarding the acting and screenplay.

100% Agree.

The Morlocks in the Time Machine remake were only CG for a few shots.
"I've been living on toxic waste for years, and I'm
fine.
Just ask my other heads!"

Jurassic Park was mostly CGI.
Wrong. The T-Rex was a life size animatronic with exception to scenes where it was a full body walking or running. Many Veloceraptor shots were puppets and animatronics, while full body jumps and running was CGI. The Gallimimus stampede was 100% CGI, as were shots of the dinosaur herds seen early in the film. Many of the brachiosaurus shots were animatronics as well, with exception to full size shots. The Triceratops was also a life size animatronic. Jurassic Park looks great even today because it used lots of traditional special effect techniques and enhanced them with CGI as opposed to making it all 100% pure CGI. That is the big problem today with films of this naturethey are nothing but overly-detailed cartoons with overblown action that can't be taken seriously.

Whose idea was it for the word "Lisp" to have an "S" in it?

Sounds like alot of people here have Pupaphobia
James Cameron's
AVATAR
See a New World
12-18-09
www.AvatarMovieZone.com

Jurassic Park was mostly CGI.
Latest film seen:
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
(2009) 7/10

lisacamillek Totally agree.

The problem is,
Yes, quite frankly there are many fallacious arguments against CGI.
Also, this is a bit off-topic, but there's something about the work that goes into those huge models. Although there's a lot of art direction and planning in CGI creatures, if something goes wrong it can be reprogrammed, like if it moves wrong. Models have to be painstakingly created right the first time because if it all goes wrong there's no back key to fix it.
It won't continue to be that way for long. A lot of practical effects are computer-managed, or produced by devices that that are 3D-printed. There are benefits, but a key drawback is that filmmakers may become sloppier or alternately they will overuse special effects, inundating the audience with a bunch of stuff that isn't relevant to whatever points the filmmakers really wants to convey.

It's called an orrery.
Bill

"There's actually a word for Aughra's model of the solar system."
I think the word you're after is "orrery".
And it's a cool looking piece of kit.
Joe