This article is devoted to the VFX community. We, at YMCinema want to make an apology to the marvelous artists that were offended by our previous article. Although we didn’t mean to offend anybody, and our pure goal was to initiate discussion, the article went viral and we got smashed. So here is our sincere and beloved apology.
‘Practical’ = VFX is done right
Our previous ‘Napoleon’ article went viral. The article talks about the minimization of CGI and VFX in Napoleon, by quoting director Ridley Scott who said that there are no CGI shots in the movie. Scott claimed that he shot the battles utilizing 300 Men, 100 Horses, 11 Cameras, and without any CGI. Even the thumbnail in the video says that. We wrote the article in order to initiate discussion, as we knew that Napoleon is loaded with VFX and CGI (like Top Gun: Maverick). However, we didn’t anticipate the amount of the offended VFX artists which we honor and respect. We got a huge amount of comments and emails, describing frustration, anxiety, and anger regarding our article and the general approach of the industry to hide the VFX artists for the sake of ‘all practical’.
Here are some of the comments we got:
- “This article is an embarrassment and insult to every VFX practitioner. It’s especially insulting to the hundreds of VFX people who worked on all the VFX heavy films name-checked in this poorly researched, badly intentioned article”.
- “What a load of misleading b. s. There are countless CGI shots in these mentioned films. Read the credits! Read the credits! Why do you think there are hundreds of digital artists there?”
- “What a clickbait rubbish! No big film is done without VFX support in this century. Never! Also, there is no movie without wardrobe location scouting or concept design. You are insulting every VFX-industry worker in here. VFX is necessary to provide safety on set and save millions in film budgets. If the director says it was practical, it means they have filmed the shot basis instead of dropping the entire frame straight to the post-production crew. True, not every director wants the Lord of the Rings look with fully digital characters added everywhere, but no VFX/CGI was used?! No way”.
- “This is Top Gun Maverick all over again, the movie that was “all practical” and then was nominated for best VFX because you know it had 2000+ VFX shots in it”.
- “Movies like this are the reason artists miss birthdays, graduations, and important moments in their and others’ lives because the work needs to be done in overtime and often has been mismanaged by the same people peddling the “ItS AlL PrAcTiCaL” BS Give them the respect they’ve earnt or GTFOH”.
- “Ha ha, I worked on the VFX for Napoleon along with many others. You would not like to see those battle scenes without VFX”.
- “CLICKBAIT ARTICLE! Hands up for all the good VFX artists who worked on that movie, you were great. Don’t let people just pretend you never worked on movies just because they can’t notice your work. It’s just because you made it too good”.
- “How can you not be utterly embarrassed at writing an article like this that pretends that hundreds of people’s work does not exist? If you had any spine whatsoever, you would write an apology article and explain how you are wrong. I suspect that we won’t see such an article though”.
This made us sad, as the VFX community has a sweet and warm spot in our hearts. Hence, we’d like to make an apology for that. Hope you will forgive us, and if not – that’s completely ok too.
Anti-CGI backlash: That’s very wrong
There’s some kind of fatigue to CGI. We don’t know why. Maybe because audiences are tired of going to the movie theater and watching a film that reminds them of cartoons. We guess that audiences appreciate more real shots and real locations than green screens. However, it means nothing about the work of VFX done on a movie – even if it’s considered ‘all practical’. Acclaimed directors are telling the audience that their mega-budget Hollywood movie was made without CGI, and was done with a practical state of mind. However, the audience should know that ‘Practical’ means that the VFX is done right. Everybody likes the term/buzzword “Practical Filmmaking” as it helps to sell the film. And those famous directors say that their films lack ‘green-screen nonsense’. However, you have to remember one rule: No CGI = invisible CGI. Watch the video below which demonstrates this logic very well:
VFX artists are busting their asses
The VFX departments are among the most difficult and intense in post-production since VFX artists are busting their asses, working long days and the requirements are skyrocketing. VFX artists on Marvel said that they worked six months of overtime every day, seven days a week, averaging 64 hours a week on a good week. A theatrical movie can’t be made without them. Even when the film is defined as ‘All Practical’, behind that there’s an army of dedicated VFX artists that make it look that ‘Practical’.
Napoleon, TGM, and hundreds of VFX artists
We all remember Top Gun: Maverick. Tom Cruise has stated numerous times that his film is a pure ‘practical’. Nevertheless, TGM contains thousands of VFX shots, done by the excellent 450 VFX artists, and even was nominated for the 2023 Academy Awards in the Best Achievement in Visual Effects category. Is this the definition of practical? As for Napoleon, there are more than 310 VFX artists who worked on it. Hence, why does Ridley Scott say that it’s all real? Here are some of the VFX roles in Napoleon: Compositor, rotoscope and paint artist look development and texture artist, and senior compositor. digital matte painter, surfacing artist, lead lighting artist, visual effects data wrangler, visual effects editor, fx supervisor, animator, layout artist, groom artist, visual effects executive producer, rotoscope and prep artist, generalist artist, CG supervisor, asset artist, head of animation, visual effects production manager, drone scanning specialist, modeler, motion capture, lead 2D artist, lead matchmove artist, pipeline supervisor, rigging supervisor, head of 2D, key fx artist, cyber scanning specialist, CFX artist, digital matte painter, lidar specialist, key crowd artist, software r&d department manager, lead tracking artist, post-visualization compositor, head of layout, and more. Explore the chart below which shows no. of VFX artists of Napoleon, TGM, and Oppenheimer So, Ridley, is it really all real?
Check out our 65-second video that summarizes the article:
Conclusion
As explained: Our previous article was written to start a discussion about the importance and essentials of VFX artists, who are getting denied and hidden under the stage of Hollywood blockbusters. However, it went viral and got out of control. So again, WE ARE SORRY! We got smashed! But we understand, and apologize in front of the VFX community. Directors must and should make a special appreciation for those magicians (the VFXers). They are super essentials and should not be ignored. On the contrary, they should get the maximum respect and gratefulness from the filmmaking community. Also, we’d like to thank all the hits, emails, comments, and feedback we got. There’s nothing like a cold shower in the winter. Go VFXers.
Appreciated.
p.s. Another thing to learn: Unfortunately in some Movies and TV Shows, not everyone gets credited on them. Many times, due to contracts or other nonsense, they allocate a limited number of names/roles to the credits. This is very evident in TV Shows but happens in Features as well, especially when studios have branches abroad.
This. There’s a Google doc going around listing the 100+ un-credited artists on Oppenheimer, and a bunch of them are roles firmly in 3D/CGI. Nolan lied to sell tickets. Cruise lied to sell tickets. Iñárritu lied to sell tickets. Ang Lee drove one of the best VFX houses ever into bankruptcy and then thanked the “tank crew” at the Oscars while the VFX crew protested desperately outside the theater. It’s a disgusting trend, and there needs to be consequences for it.
If a movie denies/diminishes the role of VFX used, they should lose eligibility for any VFX awards, full stop. (drawing an imaginary line between “VFX” and CGI” counts as diminishing VFX)
Thank you.
Thank you for the retraction, but try to have some more tact next time and maybe add a note to the article itself, which is still there in it’s misleading glory.
Try to report while equipped with the knowledge of how films are made before you parrot some press-release bullshit from Ridley Scott.
Honestly just do better, an apology really means nothing to us after all this flack. It’s nice that you feel the need to apologize but maybe try a little bit of change with your actions.
Like how about you edit the original article to make it better now that you realize you fucked up. But like other comments say try firing up your own brain cells before parroting what the director is trying to sell otherwise you are no better than a place to read advertisements.
You know you are better than this, so make your product better too
In many movies and TV shows, a lot of the people who work on visual effects (VFX) don’t get mentioned in the end credits. While the supervisors and other top people in VFX are likely to be listed, there is a large number of others, oftentimes significant contributors, that are left out. This means that the actual number of VFX artists involved is much higher than what we see in the credits. The formation of VFX unions, like the recent one at DNEG, is a hopeful step toward fixing this issue. These unions are in the early stages, but they might help in making sure more VFX workers get the recognition they deserve.
For instance, the “Oppenheimer” movie credits on the DNEG website show around 160 people, which points out how many VFX workers are often left uncredited. This example shows the gap between the real number of VFX staff and those mentioned in the credits, underlining the importance of these new unions in bringing about necessary changes in the industry.
Scroll all the way to the bottom to see all the names listed: https://www.dneg.com/show/oppenheimer/
DNEG has unionized: https://canada.iatse.net/historic-moment-for-vfx-workers-in-canada/
Two additional points that are worth saying explicitly and in detail, that I think you are still glossing over or possibly misunderstanding:
1. The counts of VFX artists on the credit roll are often vastly understated. Lots of people don’t get credited because the maximum number of credits are often part of the awarded contract, and if it turns out they needed more people to finish the film, tough for those people, they get no credits. Or because they only get credits if they were a certain minimum number of months on the project. Or some studios have arbitrary rules about which jobs are excluded, for example some have a “no facility department credits” rule that means that people who work on departments that serve multiple shows in the facility, such as software R&D, may get no credits allocated at all despite working many months or years on each film.
2. I can’t emphasize enough that “its practical + vfx” is not the same thing as “no cgi”. I assure you that there is “CGI” (meaning, something completely generated in the computer that was not filmed) in every movie. Sometimes the director, marketing department, or actors are just lying to you. You should not repeat those lies. For example, the problem with Top Gun was that they said “it was all practical”, and when repeated uncritically, you might think that when you watch the movie, you are seeing those planes that were shot practically. This was not true. They flew and shot real planes, yes, and maybe that’s part of why the movie looked great — by using that as reference (for lighting and motion, etc.), it helped keep the CG grounded in reality. But the planes you saw in the theater were CG planes, not the ones they shot practically, because the planes depicted in the story weren’t available or don’t even exist in flying condition (if I recall correctly, there simply are no longer any flight-worthy F14’s), or the maneuvers depicted, or the proximity of planes to each other or to land features, were too dangerous to film for real. The images you saw in the the theater were chock full of CG planes, and any attempt to obfuscate that is a lie that erases the enormous amount of amazing work that actually occurred to make the imagery in the film.
You guys are a joke… Ridley Scott very clearly mentioned in the interview a sequence that was done digitally. You took it out of context out of ignorance. Digital = CG = VFX was used in the movie… Please inform yourselves if you want people to take your mediocre medium seriously.
This is not an apology. This is just you raising your hands up saying “it was all intentional for starting a discussion” ( nothing in your badly researched article even hints at that ) and taking zero responsibility for publishing Lies.
Basically you are trying to make it about the VFX people not understanding your intentions rather than admitting to your malicious intentions.
I think the anti CGI sentiment is a roll of from the pretentious older folks / faux purists who think animatronics was better than CGI. [I hearken back to Aliens when that lifeless looking animatronics puppet ran across the screen after ripping out of the stomach]
The blatant disrespect / spill out is predominant amongst the vast comic book style movies today.
Everyone rallied around the writers / actors strike. Historically, VFX complaints fall on deaf ears. It’s like they are the lower class, under belly of this high value art of filmmaking
The general / casual audience do not care if the film has so much CGI or not.
If you take away CGI / VFX from most big movies in cinema, you have an unfinished / unwatchable product.
Treat these ARTISTS with the respect they deserve
I think the anti CGI sentiment is a roll of from the pretentious older folks / faux purists who think animatronics was better than CGI. [I hearken back to Aliens when that lifeless looking animatronics puppet ran across the screen after ripping out of the stomach]
The blatant disrespect / spill out is predominant amongst the vast comic book style movies today.
Everyone rallied around the writers / actors strike. Historically, VFX complaints fall on deaf ears. It’s like they are the lower class, under belly of this high value art of filmmaking
The general / casual audience do not care if the film has so much CGI or not.
If you take away CGI / VFX from most big movies in cinema, you have an unfinished / unwatchable product.
Treat these ARTISTS with the respect they deserve!!