Aesthetically speaking, what year in CG films are games comparable to?

[sn00zer]

Sure game IQ can't meet Toy Story 1, but I think aesthetically speaking it was surpassed years ago. Arguably even early powerhouse CG movies like Beowolf look arguably worse than some games now.

So where are now in the current gen when stacked against older CG movies? I think next gen is goin to be a huge leap and could end up being comparable to Ratatouille. For now thought I'm thinking were at least past Toy Story 2.

Toy Story 1 (1995)

Toy Story 2 (1999)

Monsters Inc (2001)

Spirtis Within (2001)

Beowolf (2007)

Wall E (2008)

 

[mutantmagnet]

I recall everyone sayng Kingdom Hearts 3 now matched Toy Story. You don't agree with that?

 

[sn00zer]

Shit wrong side.... Moooooods!

 

[JB2448]

Aesthetics are too subjective for this kind of comparison. It's apples to oranges.

 

[808s & Villainy]

It's hard to say. Like you said games can't match the IQ or lighting of pre-rendered CG films, but the quality of modeling and techniques has just improved so much since the days of early CG movies that they can still "look" better regardless. I'm not sure

 

[Quinton]

Shit wrong side.... Moooooods!

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Never doubt; we heard your shout

 

[Rotobit]

I'd say we've definitely surpassed Toy Story in every area besides anti aliasing and kinda-sorta lighting

I'd say we surpassed Toy Story in terms of actual models a while ago too, especially when it comes to humans. Andy in Toy Story 1 is a nightmare.

But we've got some ways to go before we match late 2000's CG movies, but it's startlingly close:

And bear in mind these examples are from Kingdom Hearts 3, a game that had to juggle a buncha different styles and so many character models. I'm still kinda miffed we barely got any current-gen games chasing the Pixar/Disney CG aesthetic outside of Knack.

 

[Serene]

Real-time raytracing will help a lot in this regard, as CG stuff has come a massive way with rendering accurate lighting in the last 15 or so years.

Also, because it has to be reactive and not pre-determined, we might never get there in regards to physics stuff like hair looking as good as it does in a CG film. At least not anytime soon.

 

[nbnt]

I'd say we've definitely surpassed Toy Story in every area besides anti aliasing and kinda-sorta lighting

I'd say we surpassed Toy Story in terms of actual models a while ago too, especially when it comes to humans. Andy in Toy Story 1 is a nightmare.

But we've got some ways to go before we match late 2000's CG movies, but it's startlingly close:

And bear in mind these examples are from Kingdom Hearts 3, a game that had to juggle a buncha different styles and so many character models. I'm still kinda miffed we barely got any current-gen games chasing the Pixar/Disney CG aesthetic outside of Knack.

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Based on these examples, we're not even close to Toy Story 1. The poly count and that flat lighting stick out like sore thumbs compared to the movie.

Let's try this again next gen.

 

[Nooblet]

I'd say we've definitely surpassed Toy Story in every area besides anti aliasing and kinda-sorta lighting

I'd say we surpassed Toy Story in terms of actual models a while ago too, especially when it comes to humans. Andy in Toy Story 1 is a nightmare.

But we've got some ways to go before we match late 2000's CG movies, but it's startlingly close:

And bear in mind these examples are from Kingdom Hearts 3, a game that had to juggle a buncha different styles and so many character models. I'm still kinda miffed we barely got any current-gen games chasing the Pixar/Disney CG aesthetic outside of Knack.

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We've definitely surpassed TS1 in lighting. TS1 just used basic phong lighting and the shadows kind of look like shit too, they are just very blurry so you don't see the artifacting much.

 

[KalBalboa]

Spirits Within wasn't 2007, it was 2001 (fyi).

 

[Nooblet]

Based on these examples, we're not even close to Toy Story 1. The poly count and that flat lighting stick out like sore thumbs compared to the movie.

Let's try this again next gen.

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TS1 didnt use polygons, it just used NURBS which are mathematical models.
Games can use it today if they want to but it's just not very effective or efficient for complex models. A tessellated model can look just as round anyway but games don't really go for it most of the time.

And models are not the only thing, also it's actually TS1 which has flat lighting as it has very basic AO that isn't even applied in most places and just has simple phong lighting.

 

[Deleted member 437]

I personally think Ff7 remake looks better than advent children.

 

[Dinjoralo]

We're improved more in terms of the tools available for creating things. The human faces in Toy Story, for example, were made from NURBS curves with tools that hadn't had decades of refinement like we have now, that probably relied a lot more on trial and error to get things right.

 

[Crossing Eden]

I'd say we've definitely surpassed Toy Story in every area besides anti aliasing and kinda-sorta lighting

I'd say we surpassed Toy Story in terms of actual models a while ago too, especially when it comes to humans. Andy in Toy Story 1 is a nightmare.

But we've got some ways to go before we match late 2000's CG movies, but it's startlingly close:

And bear in mind these examples are from Kingdom Hearts 3, a game that had to juggle a buncha different styles and so many character models. I'm still kinda miffed we barely got any current-gen games chasing the Pixar/Disney CG aesthetic outside of Knack.

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This just shows that we can match art direction but that there's still a massive gulf between realtime rendering in full fledged video games and more than a decade old CGI. Ofc, it's easy to say "we're close" but the workflow for real time rendering has taken into account the advancements made in rendering in general, for example, most games have way more accurate looking materials, like, leather actually looks like leather in video games now. Metal looks metal. Skin looks more like skin. Etc.

I personally think Ff7 remake looks better than advent children.

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FF7 remake has better art direction than Advent Children. Let's take clothes as an example, not a single character's clothing in FFVII remake will have deformation as complex as the dude in the back, not a single character will have hair or eyes as convincing as Reno, let alone the reflection in his glasses which is actually reflecting something in the scene, something his eyes are also doing:

 

[Richietto]

KH3 was pretty convincing with its Toy Story world but in general we still have a long way to go to match certain aspects of even Toy Story 1.

 

[RavFiveFour]

Games sell millions, guarantee you right now casuals don't know the difference.

 

[MidweekCoyote]

I would say that, besides hair physics and lighting, FF7: Remake is pretty much FFX CGI levels.

 

[mutantmagnet]

This just shows that we can match art direction but that there's still a massive gulf between realtime rendering in full fledged video games and more than a decade old CGI. Ofc, it's easy to say "we're close" but the workflow for real time rendering has taken into account the advancements made in rendering in general, for example, most games have way more accurate looking materials, like, leather actually looks like leather in video games now. Metal looks metal. Skin looks more like skin. Etc.

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Isn't the only thing missing are ray tracing implementations?

Considering how computationally expensive that is I would think it is good enough to declare consoles as good as Toy Story unless there are other effects I'm under-appreciating here.

 

[Crossing Eden]

I would say that, besides hair physics and lighting, FF7: Remake is pretty much FFX CGI levels.

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Nah, it goes way beyond hair and lighting, for example the models in those CGI cutscene are WAY higher poly than the models used in Remake. FFVII looks amazing but the flaws of realtime rendering are still there.

Isn't the only thing missing are ray tracing implementations?

Considering how computationally expensive that is I would think it is good enough to declare consoles as good as Toy Story unless there are other effects I'm under-appreciating here.

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It's not just raytracing, like, ray tracing isn't responsible for hair in offline renders being made of actual strands, clothing having way more complex deformation, and way higher poly models with much more complex skin shading. We'e still behind in a lot of ways.

 

[jett]

People insisting that Toy Story hasn't been surpassed are all insane. That movie is ugly as fuck and its technical and aesthetic deficiencies are on full display in every frame.

Anyway, Spirits Within vs Uncharted 4

 

[sn00zer]

People insisting that Toy Story hasn't been surpassed are all insane. That movie is ugly as fuck and its technical and aesthetic deficiencies are on full display in every frame.

Anyway, Spirits Within vs Uncharted 4

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Jeezus

 

[Dinjoralo]

Material wise, yeah, we're well past Toy Story. Other aspects not so much, but we can make skin that reasonably looks like skin.

 

[Crossing Eden]

People insisting that Toy Story hasn't been surpassed are all insane. That movie is ugly as fuck and its technical and aesthetic deficiencies are on full display in every frame.

Anyway, Spirits Within vs Uncharted 4

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TFW spirits within still has better looking hair than most if not all video games. 👀

 

[Serene]

TFW spirits within still has better looking hair than most if not all video games. 👀

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Just by the nature of being real-time, hair is probably the furthest thing from CG and it always will be.

 

[sn00zer]

TFW spirits within still has better looking hair than most if not all video games. 👀

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Sure, but everything else in the image seems like something that could be done today and done better.

 

[mutantmagnet]

It's not just raytracing, like, ray tracing isn't responsible for hair in offline renders being made of actual strands, clothing having way more complex deformation, and way higher poly models with much more complex skin shading. We'e still behind in a lot of ways.

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Regarding hair keep in mind this is Toy story 1 I was focused on. They didn't attempt it either until the sequels.

As for the clothing deformation I think we've already seen something as complex as that but not in KH3. The way Nintendo made Donkey Kong's hair react to his movements suggest this technique isn't beyond the abilities of current gen hardware to execute at the same time as everything else they did but I can't imagine how expensive that would be.

 

[Much]

People insisting that Toy Story hasn't been surpassed are all insane. That movie is ugly as fuck and its technical and aesthetic deficiencies are on full display in every frame.

Anyway, Spirits Within vs Uncharted 4

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Yeah, this is it. Uncharted 4 is to me something that is still next-level crazy impressive.

 

[Nooblet]

Isn't the only thing missing are ray tracing implementations?

Considering how computationally expensive that is I would think it is good enough to declare consoles as good as Toy Story unless there are other effects I'm under-appreciating here.

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Advent Children didn't use ray tracing. So those reflections are basically planer reflections as in rendering that thing its reflecting in its entirety.
Infact up until Cars ray tracing was not really used in CG commonly.

 

[DarthBuzzard]

Just by the nature of being real-time, hair is probably the furthest thing from CG and it always will be.

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Not really. Rendering techniques are always improving and closing the gap. The game industry is much more deeply involved with optimization than the CGI industry.

 

[Svejk]

The OG 1993 Jurassic Park still looks better than most games of today.

 

[Nooblet]

Sure, but everything else in the image seems like something that could be done today and done better.

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When Spirits Within came out sub surface scattering was not a thing, hence you see character models without SSS, having very chalky skin.

 

[MidweekCoyote]

Nah, it goes way beyond hair and lighting, for example the models in those CGI cutscene are WAY higher poly than the models used in Remake. FFVII looks amazing but the flaws of realtime rendering are still there.

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I actually won't debate this as my knowledge of CG and how it works is pretty much zero. I only stated how it feels like for me. It seems much better than FFVIII and FFIX, while on par with FFX a good deal. Again, laymans point of view.

Also, while the Uncharted example above shows how well we have done with skin and models, even high budget movies like Rogue One struggle with facial animations. We still have a long way to go on that front. I'm pretty sure Paul Walker is still the most realistic and well animated CG model in movies?

 

[jett]

I personally think Ff7 remake looks better than advent children.

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That's because Advent Children looks like trash.

 

[Crossing Eden]

Regarding hair keep in mind this is Toy story 1 I was focused on. They didn't attempt it either until the sequels.

As for the clothing deformation I think we've already seen something as complex as that but not in KH3. The way Nintendo made Donkey Kong's hair react to his movements suggest this technique isn't beyond the abilities of current gen hardware to execute at the same time as everything else they did but I can't imagine how expensive that would be.

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Nah, we haven't even come close when it come to deformation. We have very visually pleasing looking clothing in video games but it still looks hella fake compared to how clothing actually behaves. We genuinely take it for granted in CG films because we're so used to it but if a game ever came out that ever even remotely matched it our heads would explode. And that goes for most things when it comes to realtime rendering. Games are not ugly, modern games are fucking gorgeous and under the right circumstances can produce visuals that match our mind's eye of what CG is supposed to look like, but then you go and watch a 2000s movie and it's like, "damn we're still so far behind in so many areas..."

Just by the nature of being real-time, hair is probably the furthest thing from CG and it always will be.

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It's very unfortunate.

I actually won't debate this as my knowledge of CG and how it works is pretty much zero. I only stated how it feels like for me. It seems much better than FFVIII and FFIX, while on par with FFX a good deal. Again, laymans point of view.

Also, while the Uncharted example above shows how well we have done with skin and models, even high budget movies like Rogue One struggle with facial animations. We still have a long way to go. I'm pretty sure Paul Walker is still the most realistic and well animated CG model in movies?

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It's impossible to name one thing as the most realistic and well animated CG character in movies because it depends on the time the vfx artists were given for the project not to mention that SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much CGI is straight up invisible to even other vfx artists. Like, no one watched Avenger's Endgame and thought, "yep, those time travel suits are definitely ALL CGI."

 

[Nooblet]

Half of the techniques used in games today either didn't exist in those 90s/early 2000s CG or only existed in theory but not really practical to implement. And the ones that did exist were often done really poorly and in a basic manner. About the only advantage CGs from those eras have had is aliasing, reflections (but RT reflections have caught up and are more accurate), triangle counts...and even then quite a few of those old CGs have really basic/simplistic modelling. Current gen lighting, texturing and material is so far beyond CG of that era that it's not even funny.

The OG 1993 Jurassic Park still looks better than most games of today.

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Well it should considering most of the movie is animatronics.
The actual CG parts have aged sort of ok simply because most of the time they are done in really dark environments, so it's harder to spot flaws. The ones that are done in brighter environments don't really hold up all that well.

 

[Rotobit]

Spin-off thread idea: Have graphics in games become comparable to old Graphics Card box art?

(this was inspired by that one Spirits Within screenshot looking like it'd fit perfectly on one of these)

 

[Deleted member 51539]

There will always be peaks and lows. You can't pinpoint where we're at that way.

Anyway, here's Sid.

 

[Serene]

Not really. Rendering techniques are always improving and closing the gap. The game industry is much more deeply involved with optimization than the CGI industry.

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Hair is one of the most reactive and volatile things we physically have. A real-time engine that has to approximate its appearance and deformation hundreds/thousands of times a second will never approach the quality of any halfway decent pre-rendered CG that can be designed and animated knowing exactly where every strand needs to be at every moment.

Obviously it will get better, but it is the aspect that will always be playing catch-up the most and be the most behind the curve.

 

[Eggiem]

The OG 1993 Jurassic Park still looks better than most games of today.

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Lol. That's because most of it is real.

 

[Crossing Eden]

The game industry is much more deeply involved with optimization than the CGI industry.

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I mean that's mostly because technology has advanced to the point where the vfx industry is actively pursuing realtime rendering so that stuff can get done in a faster amount of time.

That's because Advent Children looks like trash.

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"What should the art direction of a movie sequel to this colorful ass game be?"

"Gray and dreary as fuck?"

"Yea gray and dreary as fuck"

 

[Le Dude]

Meh, I feel like you can find some incredible looking game screenshots, but IMO they almost always look worse in motion and the fact that they're games is painfully obvious at most points.

 

[MidweekCoyote]

Half of the techniques used in games today either didn't exist in those 90s/early 2000s CG or only existed in theory but not really practical to implement.

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In that case, I guess the thread question could be restated as this:

What CG movies/FMVs can be visually recreated 1:1 in real time using modern techniques?

 

[TheJollyCorner]

Has Lawnmower Man been topped?

Answer: Never.

 

[jett]

The OG 1993 Jurassic Park still looks better than most games of today.

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One of the few shots of actual dino CGI:

 

[Svejk]

Lol. That's because most of it is real.

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Y'all funny. No shit. Thought it was obvious I'm referencing the cgi shots; t-rex breaking out his cage/wires in the rain, his final scene in the auditorium... Come on, folks. Lol

 

[Crossing Eden]

I feel like the way movies and video games advanced and are perceived also contribute to the discussion. Like, marketing in video games treated low poly movies with dead eyes as "super realistic" while CG movies, the very notable ones at least, were always incredibly stylized and still are. Like, the marketing of Monster's Inc didn't include, "fur that looks realistic" by my knowledge compared to any of the tressfx trailers for the witcher 3

 

[Serene]

I feel like the way movies and video games advanced and are perceived also contribute to the discussion. Like, marketing in video games treated low poly movies with dead eyes as "super realistic" while CG movies, the very notable ones at least, were always incredibly stylized and still are. Like, the marketing of Monster's Inc didn't include, "fur that looks realistic" by my knowledge compared to any of the tressfx trailers for the witcher 3

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A lot of games seek to replicate. A lot of animated films seek to innovate. It's kinda that simple. You don't see a lot of animated films that try to be realistic.

 

[Nooblet]

In that case, I guess the thread question could be restated as this:

What CG movies/FMVs can be visually recreated 1:1 in real time using modern techniques?

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Yep basically.
For instance look at TS1's NURBs, perfectly round models and you can do that today because it doesn't actually use polygons but it's just not a very efficient and effective modeling method as you have limitations as it is hard to make complex models out of it, plus it can't be tweaked around much, and as such not very suitable for artists and how they work. If a model uses tessellation then it's effectively going to have perfectly round edges anyway even with polygons.

But if all you want is to remake TS1 visuals then I guess you can use them. Also TS1 was originally only 720P afaik.

 

[Buttzerker]

I find video game cinematics/tech demos to be a better comparison.

Like we passed the Samaritan Demo this gen for sure, which was about a decade ago. Or like, which FF CGI are we at? Etc.