Discuss the Ghostbusters movie that was released in 2016.
#4903655
I know there are posts out there already that deal with all the problems with GB16 but I wanted to create a discussion of the effects and the aesthetic of CGI VS the photochemical/optical printing method of the originals. So let's starts...

I've written before on how big of an issue I have with the design aspects of the ghosts in GB16 and the quality of the CGI. In short, it all looks bad to me. Even the proton gun streams look bad. I'm trying to approach this with as little nostalgia as possible. I'm not saying things were better back in the day just because it was back in the day. That being said the ghosts in the original films look much more believable to me. Not the terror dogs, but the ghosts. The library ghost when we first see her? It's subtle and ethereal. Compare that to the female Ghost we meet in the mansion in GB2016. It draws too much attention to itself. It's too bright. It doesn't look wondrous or scary it looks..clean, sterile & fake.

Let's looks the proton stream FX. My personal favourite "look" is the GB2 version. But we also get great streams in GB1, mostly during the Gozer battle. The quality improves as the movie progresses. The first beams shot at the cleaning lady aren't quite there yet in regards to quality. I'm GB2? They are totally believable 100% of the time and look great. In GB16 they look...not good. The beam looks too fat and again, it looks too clean and sterile. It looks like photoshop work I've seen in fan films. There's something about the rotoscoping effect that works for the proton gun effect that CGI, at least the CGI as used in GB16, can't get right. I don't know why that is. But the Ghostbusters shooting at Mr Stay Puft looks 100 times better than the concert bust.

There is something about CGI that makes Ghosts look kind of lame. Scooby Doo and Haunted Mansion are examples of this. We can now add GB16 in with those. It's an aesthetic thing. More practical effects when it comes to ghosts works much better. I don't think I'm the only one to think so.

So what's going on here? Did GB2016 just have a poor design team? CGI can do robots and destruction and all kinds of things. But fire? Plasma? I don't know. I just know I hate the look of those GB16 proton beams.

I should note that I'm not a CGI hater. I love great effects work like Davey Jones in the Pirates flicks. Gollum in Lord of the Rings. I love the Star Wars prequels even though a common criticsm is they had too much CGI. CGI can do amazing things. But one thing that always had me worried/Curious about a GB3 film was how they were going to deal with the evolution of movie technology since 1989. I remember thinking about this very issue in 1999 when it looked like a GB3 was just around the corner. Sometimes limitations bring about the best In creativity. Had Ghostbusters been made in 2016 it might have looked more like the original Dan Aykroyd pitch that was deemed far too expensive at the time. Now? They could do it no problem. But thank god that didn't happen. Same thing happened with the original Star Wars films. Han Solo was at one point suppose to be a lizard looking thing. If Lucas had made the films with unlimited control and budget like he did the prequels, they would be vastly different. But I digress..
seekandannoy liked this
#4903661
There are 4/5 different protonbeams in the movie as Holtzmann makes adjustments to the strength of the beams and design of the packs. They were all bad, or just different to you?

Can't say it bothered me, but I spot enough tells in the old movies where special effects were used, Slimer rotating around the chandelier, Puft turning transparant when stomping on the church, rough edges when black screens are used, weird wrinkles in rubber hands, Matt paintings etc, but that's probably because I did a few classes on them when I was still in school. The movie being shown HD or 4K won't help (old) special effects either as yes, that makes it harder to get right as we get so see much more detail.

Overall, I still liked the effects and designs in all three movies. Though Slimer and Scoleri Brothers in GB2 I thought were a bit too cartoony when compared to the other ghosts in that movie. (I know I'm alone on the Scoleri design hehe). The new movie used a lighter tone in ghosts and their scarines. I really love the details on lady Eldridge, the balloons, Rowan burning and especially the ringmaster, but yeah it's a different designpolicy when compared to the originals.
Sav C liked this
#4903668
For me it really depends on the effect. In some moments in ATC during the Rowan fight I really forgot I was watching CGI, it was that good. Also the 2016 spectral effects they went for more of an "aura" around the ghost. Like in the mansion lady, the sparkles around her interacting with the air. I liked it.

But it was too bright and too in your face if you ask me, with all the blue glows.

My favorite is still GB1. It was the most believable. Like the slime being just transparent but slightly yellow, and no cartoon colors. Also when you see slimer with the foodcart it looks surreal because of the practical nature of the effect.

GB2 effects I don't like much. The streams looked far too thin and wimpy compared to GB1 for me. Slimers cheeks puffed out and his forehead became huge in trying to make him more kid friendly. In GB1 Slimer looked "nasty" and completely unpredictable. The weirdness of it made it scary too in a way.

In GB2 he became a docile kids cartoon character even driving a bus, etc.

I think ATC pushed the comedy humor even further, where now he even had a cute little girlfriend. I get where they were going with it but it wasn't for me. It lost it's edgyness/weirdness for me.

Although the streams were too pink for me in ATC, I loved the stream physics in the last movie though. When Yates fires it at the bulls eye and when Tolan fires it from behind the group in the hallway chase at Mayhem, you can really see they thought about the stream dynamics and how the stream behaves similar to a voltage / plasma arc discharge bending. I loved that.
Alphagaia liked this
#4903671
Yeah, the best effect in the whole GBfranchise for me is Slimer and the foodcart. The interaction with the food, the sounds, camera angles, Dan's reaction and effectdesign still holds up. The only thing I did not like was the effect of him escaping through the wall. That whole scene is such a great way to describe Ghostbusters as well.
One time, Sav C, RichardLess liked this
#4903675
I'll have to agree with you on the Slimer still holding up from GB1. The hotel bust is still easily my favorite scene.
As far as CGI goes I always felt GB2 had better effects then GB1. ATC was sub par for what could have been done with today's 3D modeling software. While the special effects were okay it was more like watching a cartoon then a movie.
Sav C liked this
#4903723
Alphagaia wrote:Yeah, the best effect in the whole GBfranchise for me is Slimer and the foodcart. The interaction with the food, the sounds, camera angles, Dan's reaction and effectdesign still holds up. The only thing I did not like was the effect of him escaping through the wall. That whole scene is such a great way to describe Ghostbusters as well.
Funny enough it was this exact scene that inspired me to write this very topic. I was watching the first movie the other day and I was like "This looks real to me. This is better than anything in GB16 and it was done in 1984". Again, just the bit where we first encounter Slimer. It's just fantastic. The details we see and we get a real good look at him, no matte lines, no jarring motion shifts. It's a perfect effect. There's a real personality to Slimer in that bit. One detail I've ALWAYS loved is the cigarette sticking to Dan's lip. I don't know why, I just love that. It was probably an accident but it's just a great little human moment.

Again, I'm not saying the effects are perfect in the first film. Obviously there are some moments I'm sure the filmmakers would love to get to refine, especially with blu ray(the terror dog red light bulb eye and then the white light bulb in the mouth..yikes. Though I'm glad they cleaned up the matte lines for the terror dogs chasing Louis and then again on the rooftop after the transformation). While I never wanted the CGI enhancement of the Star Wars special editions, I've always secretly wished for a Ghostbusters: Special Edition where they fix a couple of the terror dog FX. Erased the wire that pulls down the stone face on Gozers Temple. But I get why they don't do it and that's fine. That's the movie we've always loved. When I saw the 4K remastered 2014 blu ray(not the garbage 2009 one) I jumped for joy when I noticed that someone had cleaned up the matte lines on the terror dogs.

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