Official 'The Hobbit' Thread - Part 15

[vinsanity]

Haters gonna hate. I liked the movies (not as much as the LOTR ones) and can't wait to see this one.

 

[regwec]

You seem to be arguing that movies should not be discussed except by movie directors. Ask yourself who directors make movies for. Other directors, or everybody else? If it's the latter, then all opinions count, no matter how inexpert.

 

[Broseph44]

That trailer gave me goosebumps.

Definitely man, very excited.

 

[Marvolo]

Following behind the scenes or reading "books" does not mean knowing squat about the movie making process, I'm talking about the actual process, which is an entirely different thing.

Youre gonna have to explain which process you are speaking of? What goes on on set? The stress? The set-up? The technical terms? The different crew and their specific jobs? The casting process, and guilds and red tape? The editing process and what it entails? The scoring process? Scripting process? The awful hours and grueling scheduling. The contracts. The pitch, the executives, and the jobs of the various producers. Budgeting. Studio bureaucracy. Etc. Yeah more than a few of us understand and know how all this works.

Most people here know enough about movie making to have an appreciation for it. The people here are fans of the art after all. And no one here thinks the director "pushes a button and out pops a movie."

And why did you put books in quotation marks? You do know that there are many many books available that explain and detail the movie making process, right? Books that cover specific movie productions in great detail and other books that discuss the process in general.

 

[CGHulk]

http://www-images.theonering.org/torwp/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Hobbit_3_Horizontal_Teaser.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Ey32MA1.jpg

 

[dark_b]

h


http://i.imgur.com/Ey32MA1.jpg

when it works it works. this looks like a painting come to life. i like the soft lighting,the colors,the bloom-glow.

 

[Tacit Ronin]

I like how the cinematography mirrors the OT.

The first one was the most romantic and fairytale like. Dominated by amber or blue hues.

The second one was immediately darker with a desaturated pallette and the presence of sinister greens.

This one looks to have the triumphant highlights of the rising sun striped all across the frame as well as a more vibrant saturation of color as it was in ROTK.


The difference of course being that the OT had the pristine texture of cellulite, helping you cross the valley of reality to myth. While the Hobbit trilogy and its digital photography looks so coldly real that you are always aware it is make believe.

 

[CGHulk]

Dark_b that's a bad screen grab. Here's a better one without any augmentation!
http://s17.postimg.org/l298hmr25/Untitled.png

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Following behind the scenes or reading "books" does not mean knowing squat about the movie making process, I'm talking about the actual process, which is an entirely different thing.

The other part is simply my anger at some of the statements here, discussion or not, opinions or not, there is a moment where there is too much BS around, but hey, that's the Internet for you.

Yes, well if you stopped spreading so much, there would be a bit less.

Youre gonna have to explain which process you are speaking of? What goes on on set? The stress? The set-up? The technical terms? The different crew and their specific jobs? The casting process, and guilds and red tape? The editing process and what it entails? The scoring process? Scripting process? The awful hours and grueling scheduling. The contracts. The pitch, the executives, and the jobs of the various producers. Budgeting. Studio bureaucracy. Etc. Yeah more than a few of us understand and know how all this works.

Most people here know enough about movie making to have an appreciation for it. The people here are fans of the art after all. And no one here thinks the director "pushes a button and out pops a movie."

And why did you put books in quotation marks? You do know that there are many many books available that explain and detail the movie making process, right? Books that cover specific movie productions in great detail and other books that discuss the process in general.

Tim is ranting and raving, he did this over TASM2. He takes it extremely personally. If you don't agree, he can't handle it. Suddenly you are speaking BS. I, like many others understand and appreciate the movie making process. That does not suddenly change what ends up on screen.

FotR is one of my favorite films. I love TTT. I can't sit through RotK. And it isn't because I decided to simply dislike RotK.

 

[Victarion]

The big battles happen in TTT and ROTK. If you want to watch a fantasy epic that skirts around the battles, then watch Game of Thrones or something else.

Game of Thrones has had about 2 battle sequences, each being roughly an hour long. I preferred the most recent, the Battle of Castle Black, moreso than the battles in LOTR for a couple of reasons. First, I felt more invested, emotionally speaking, in the characters involved. Second, the craftsmanship. I love the cinematography of the battle itself, coupled with the fact that most of the fighting is actors vs actors, instead of actors vs CGI. I'm not saying your post is wrong; if one wants a fantasy epic that gets one invested in the battles, take Rowsdower!'s advice.

Not to disparage Jackson's characters. Thorin and Balin are my favorites of his Middle Earth bunch, as is Gandalf the Grey. Its just that, for something whose main strength lay in its battle sequences, the trilogy is pretty lacking sans Helm's Deep.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Yeah, The Battle of the Blackwater and The Siege of Castle Black are great filmmaking.

 

[Octoberist]

I agree about Game of Thrones. SO good.

 

[Octoberist]

I like how the cinematography mirrors the OT.

The first one was the most romantic and fairytale like. Dominated by amber or blue hues.

The second one was immediately darker with a desaturated pallette and the presence of sinister greens.

This one looks to have the triumphant highlights of the rising sun striped all across the frame as well as a more vibrant saturation of color as it was in ROTK.


The difference of course being that the OT had the pristine texture of cellulite, helping you cross the valley of reality to myth. While the Hobbit trilogy and its digital photography looks so coldly real that you are always aware it is make believe.

I think if Jackson wanted to, he can duplicate the richer film (with grain) look with digital. Digital has gotten to the point where it is beautiful (Mad Max Fury Road) but often it gets misused, me thinks.

With digital you can adjust the resolution, use different lenses, rewire how you do the lighting, do a film pass (add artificial grain) and bam, it'll look as good as Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (also digital). But it depends if the filmmaker wants to do that or not with this new tech. I'm all about forward thinking, but IF something works, then it works and there's no need to reinvent the wheel.

 

[DarkKnight88]

Game of Thrones has had about 2 battle sequences, each being roughly an hour long. I preferred the most recent, the Battle of Castle Black, moreso than the battles in LOTR for a couple of reasons. First, I felt more invested, emotionally speaking, in the characters involved.

See that's been my problem with Game of Thrones (the show, haven't read the books yet). I don't care for any of the characters while Lord of the Rings I'm completely invested in each and every one of them.

Funny enough, after hearing all the complaints about how long the Hobbit movies are I actually think some episodes of GOT could be cut down substantially. There's a lot of dead air in many episodes.

 

[Octoberist]

See that's been my problem with Game of Thrones (the show, haven't read the books yet). I don't care for any of the characters while Lord of the Rings I'm completely invested in each and every one of them.

Funny enough, after hearing all the complaints about how long the Hobbit movies are I actually think some episodes of GOT could be cut down substantially. There's a lot of dead air in many episodes.

God I love Game of Thrones. LOVE IT!

 

[Tim_Riggins]

You can add as much grain as you want, it'll never look like film, I certainly see what you're saying regarding texture, it won't look like film but it'll look better, DOPA looks really good but it has that typical Arri Alexa look, I wish they could just add a layer of grain to make it less clinical & smooth.

The Hobbit movies have this slight texture going on, they look damn good. But hell, all those movies would look 10 times better if shot on 35 mm, you just can't beat film & its organic quality.

 

[Octoberist]

You can add as much grain as you want, it'll never look like film, I certainly see what you're saying regarding texture, it won't look like film but it'll look better, DOPA looks really good but it has that typical Arri Alexa look, I wish they could just add a layer of grain to make it less clinical & smooth.

The Hobbit movies have this slight texture going on, they look damn good. But hell, all those movies would look 10 times better if shot on 35 mm, you just can't beat film & its organic quality.

My point is that I think digital is here to stay, but because it's so new, directors and DOP need to really take advantage of it. For example, Edge of Tommorow looked great and it was shot with digital. Same thing with Dawn/Apes. Oblivion looks nice as well.

My biggest beef with digital is when it looks videoish. Like in Thor 2, there were a few scenes that looked video-ish and cheap. Be more consistent people.

But yes, film will always look more rich with the textures. The greatest example of the digital vs. film argument is with Pirates 4, which used a Red camera. Despite a different director, it had the same DOP from the previous Pirates film and wow, there's a stark difference. The first three, esp the first one, looked way better.

 

[Lord]

My point is that I think digital is here to stay, but because it's so new, directors and DOP need to really take advantage of it. For example, Edge of Tommorow looked great and it was shot with digital. Same thing with Dawn/Apes. Oblivion looks nice as well.

My biggest beef with digital is when it looks videoish. Like in Thor 2, there were a few scenes that looked video-ish and cheap. Be more consistent people.

But yes, film will always look more rich with the textures. The greatest example of the digital vs. film argument is with Pirates 4, which used a Red camera. Despite a different director, it had the same DOP from the previous Pirates film and wow, there's a stark difference. The first three, esp the first one, looked way better.

It was a better film, but if there's something that was vastly improved for Pirates 2 and 3, it was without a doubt the cinematography, it was astonishing, Lone Ranger also looked realy good visualy, i don't think Curse of the Black Pearl was as good looking as those.

 

[Marvolo]

So I'm watching the special feature about Azog on the AUJ EE, and it's pretty crazy. The animators got the final Azog design six weeks before the film had to be delivered. They had to build and animate Azog in 6 weeks! I knew it was close to the wire, but I had no idea it was that close.

 

[regwec]

Which puts it into perspective: as unsatisfactory as Azog looks, the animators did a great job within the confines of permitted time.

 

[redhawk23]

The problems with Azog are mostly in the design, just kind of bland, but he pretty much always looked solid and physically present rather than having the weird almost flat 'painted in' look cgi characters sometimes have.

 

[Lord]

I wouldn't call his design bland, he stands well in the middle of a bunch of orcs due to his look in fact.

 

[redhawk23]

You can add as much grain as you want, it'll never look like film, I certainly see what you're saying regarding texture, it won't look like film but it'll look better, DOPA looks really good but it has that typical Arri Alexa look, I wish they could just add a layer of grain to make it less clinical & smooth.

The Hobbit movies have this slight texture going on, they look damn good. But hell, all those movies would look 10 times better if shot on 35 mm, you just can't beat film & its organic quality.

Meh. For films in a series they probably should have sought to match the aesthetic but there are some wonderfully shot digital films. Its not as if all movies shot on film looked the same. Film stock from the 90s differed in texture and grain from film in the 60s and 70s. Coloring techniques made for widely different looking movies from decade to decade.

 

[redhawk23]

I wouldn't call his design bland, he stands well in the middle of a bunch of orcs due to his look in fact.

He's different from the other orcs but I don't find him to be that interesting.

 

[Lord]

I actualy liked his look, i just don't think he should have been in the films.