Visual Effects Rule, DudeIs less still more? Or is more, more? Or has visual anarchy set in? "This is boring — I want more eye candy!" hollered The Producer, directly into my left ear. Then, to the visual effects artist, "Is that the best you can do?" "No, I can add as much cheese as you can stomach," Paul S. shot back, "but it's still going to be a boring show." Clearly, it was time for a nicotine break. Paul and I stepped outside into the brisk October night, while the producer stayed behind to phone L.A. and yell into someone else's ear. We drank our steaming coffee and grumbled to each other. Paul blew a stream of smoke at the moon and said, "Start with a boring script, fold in some boring interviews, bake at 350 for half an hour...and you will have a boring documentary." Without doubt, the show was boring. But not for lack of 'eye candy'. For this, the sixth episode of a half-hour television documentary series, we were rapidly approaching $40,000 over budget — on stock footage alone. And now we were living in the online suite. All the visual effects in the world were not going to bring this corpse back to life. Once Upon a Time…Less was MoreThe above-mentioned atrocity took place in the mid-90s, when some producers (present company excepted, of course) had seemingly forgotten that the primary objective of a television production is to tell a story. Even in the formerly conservative field of documentary production, many folks were laboring under the misconception that they were making music videos. But it wasn't always this way. The use of visual effects and graphics in the television industry has, traditionally, been tastefully guided by the Less is More principle. Even as new tools crowded the online suite, they were employed with restraint. Then came music videos, and everything went straight to Hell. At first, the resulting anarchy was prudently confined to MTV, where flash rules over content. The only rule is that you must hold the viewer's eyeballs in a death-grip while they listen to the song — which is the true content of the video. This is not really a criticism — the music video is a frighteningly effective way to sell compact discs, concert tickets and merchandise. It is the ultimate "branding instrument," to borrow a phrase from those annoying marketing guys. It didn't take long for Madison Avenue to notice the success of music videos, and suddenly commercial spots were giving us headaches. Then, network sports producers began to deliver batting statistics to our tired eyes via computer-generated futuristic space-machine things, accompanied by metallic zip-cuchunk-clank sounds. (Do you improve baseball by making it look and sound like a video game? Call me a purist…I have to vote 'no'.) Naturally, the film industry jumped in with both feet, focused squarely on explosive spectacle — assaults on our senses that make Busby Berkeley seem timid. Now we go to the mega-plex to watch a two-hour commercial for the movie we paid to see. The visual effects are rendered in glorious 3D and we get to see a lot of neat stuff blow up, but the characters are as flat as cardboard. No Need to DespairDocumentary television has recently pulled back from the brink, if recent experience is any indication. Sports programming also seems to have come to its senses. Go ahead and make your (teen-skewing) X-treme sports and professional wrestling look like video games. But hands-off the National Pastime. "About five years ago, it was at its worst," says Producer Charles Self of 2000 Strong, a full-service production and design studio based in Los Angeles and New York. "But in the last couple of years, the cleaner look has come back…now there's more compositing to make 3D elements blend in with live action...the look is less 3D heavy, more realistic." 2000 Strong's design team, brothers Craig and Steve Tozzi, use After Effects, Flame, Henry and, of course, SOFTIMAGE®|3D software to make promos and network IDs for networks including A&E, TBS, ABC, History Channel and TLC.
"For A&E's Biography "Theme Week" promos, we get Digibeta footage from the program, then incorporate our own design elements," says Self. "We're a very design-oriented shop and we want a clean, edgy look." Self says that by seamlessly blending 3D effects with live-action footage, a visual gag can be made to look so real that more doesn't have to be less. The newest toys can generate elegant effects that become invisible, when created by a talented artist. Invisible effects, such as shortening depth-of-field to direct the viewer's attention and improve the look of a shot, are exempt from the less is more principle. They are widely and wisely used, without ever distracting the viewer, who isn't even aware that an effect was used. The Emergence of a New Paradigm…Or Just a lot of Talk?Having conducted an extensive poll of more than one editor, producer, art director, graphic artist and the Russian guy who empties the waste-paper baskets in the edit suite at midnight, we find a wide divergence of opinion. The question, "whatever happened to less is more?" yields several variations of the following sentiments...
Michael Churchill is a busy Toronto animator and art director. He's created effects for commercial spots, documentaries, music videos, network specials and corporate clients, mostly using Maya by Alias|Wavefront. This month, he joins Twister Digital Design, where he will be adding SOFTIMAGE|3D to his arsenal. He says the issue of "how much" is subtle, especially since the new tools of the trade have raised the quality of effects to such heights. "In the past, when the technology wasn't quite there, we couldn't always sell the gag," says Churchill, "it was just too ambitious to do properly. The new tools are so good that you can do a lot more...but even if it looks great it still has to serve the overall project." As art director for the documentary "September 1972," Churchill created an opening title animation, background designs and transitional elements that included a watery surface and fiery explosion. The documentary covered the epic hockey battle between Team Canada and the USSR, he says, "so the producer wanted an explosion element, to convey the feeling that, 'these guys went to war...war on ice.'" The appropriate use of visual effects is difficult to quantify. It usually comes down to experience and instinct, suggests Churchill. "It's a matter of making sure that the effect is motivated, imparts information and is pleasing to the eye…there are some young prodigies out there who seem born with the instinct, but for most people, experience is the key...that's why they call it, 'having a developed eye.'" It seems that the less is more principle isn't dead, after all. It was just forced into temporary hibernation by a new generation of artists and producers, using a new generation of technology. "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should," asserts Greg Day, of Seattle's Dog Day Editing. Day is an editor and Softimage artist, who also works with Discreet's smoke* and fire*. He is a big fan of the latest toys, but admits that it's easy to get carried away. For Bill Nye The Science Guy, Day enjoyed the freedom to do just that. "Early on, we went through a phase where there was almost a competition…trying to out-do each other with editing and effects. Because, technically, it was a kid's show, we could get away with a lot…a great opportunity to stretch yourself and try new stuff. It was fun to see how far you can go, but you have to know when to pull back…or it gets in the way of storytelling." This level of freedom did, however, have its benefits. Day was nominated for two daytime Emmy Awards for single-camera editing in the '94-'95 and '95-'96 seasons. None is Definitely Less...UsuallyAs for documentaries, Day's concerns run deeper than just ham-fisted effects and poor taste. "There's always the danger of using effects to create a false record," he warns. "You can create any effect you want, but how far can you go before you're not making a documentary?" Day points to the use of re-creations, which can be effected to resemble historical footage. "I worry about producers who say, 'We have to create more visuals because we don't trust our audience to get it.' What they're really saying is, 'we don't trust our storytelling ability.'" A depressing number of documentary producers (present company excepted, again) get well into post before they realize that their base material is not sufficient to tell the intended story. Instead of shooting another interview and additional b-roll, they try to "fix it in post" with smoke and mirrors. You don't have to be Ken Burns to know that stuffing a documentary into the sequined bikini of a music video makes for a lousy documentary and an even worse music video. Day considers himself fortunate to work with the producers at PBS, whose approach has remained fairly stable over the years. "PBS is very good at simple, confident storytelling," he says, simply and confidently. And he should know, having cut their first HDTV broadcast, "Chihuly Over Venice." The 90-minute documentary of glass-artist Dale Chihuly was produced at KCTS/9, Seattle. Because of the limited High-Def online facilities available at the time, the doc was made entirely without visual effects. "The most elaborate effect we used was a dissolve," says Day. "The story and images were so compelling that effects would have only been a distraction."
Of course, if you shoot High-Def in the canals of Venice, your images don't need a lot of help. But for the vast majority of documentaries, Day does not mean to suggest that none is more. Context is the key. "Look at the Ken Burns stuff," he explains. "Baseball is, to me, the quintessential modern documentary...it achieved such a smooth flow between stills, interviews, film, video and narration...and the effects never got in the way. They deepened the mood and supported the information." Whether integrated and invisible, clean and edgy, motivated and informative, or any combination of these virtues, visual effects can lift the viewer's experience in subtle and profound ways. The skillful use of effects does, in fact, deepen mood, support storytelling and win little gold statuettes. Greg Day sums it up best: "I started out in theatre, and we had a saying, 'If people are looking that closely at the scenery, then there's something wrong with your story...visual effects are the scenery, not the story." Corporate Video: Make a Silk Purse out of This, Smarty PantsThen there's corporate video, which is decidedly not glamorous but gets the rent paid on time. Many corporate clients seem to labor under the misconception that they are making slide shows...or worse, radio programming. And so the corporate world is subjected to a sleep-inducing parade of talking heads, with a static 'beauty shot' of the head office's entranceway. Sexy stuff. Until recently, most corporate clients reacted to the suggestion of visual effects by responding, "Oh, yeah, I love those...my favorites are the clock wipes and page peels." Aside from being hideous, such low-tech contrivances do not deepen mood or support storytelling. They cannot be used with a straight face. "Corporate is the one place that could use more flash," says Greg Day. "If you want to do something fun and you can convince the client to go along, then go for it. It might wake up the audience." Indeed, convincing the corporate client is no mean feat. Many clients are worried about offending the most sensitive member of their audience. Even more are worried about offending their bosses. Bureaucracy and office politics loom large, so here we must tread with care. The corporate client must be assured that he is in good hands. He may be the world's leading authority in widget design, but you are the video expert, and he must know that you will not make him appear foolish in front of his colleagues. This is a trust developed over time. "Just make sure you use good, clean design," adds Michael Churchill. "Keep it tasteful and make sure you are helping to sell the message." This good, clean design can be seen in Churchill's work for IBM's award-winning Visual Banker video. IBM is one of the early innovators in the world of corporate video, and they are not afraid to make a bold visual statement, so Churchill was given a lot of latitude. "That project presented an interesting concept," he explains, "to visually portray the history of banking, from its beginning with an abacus to old-style teller windows to the new computerization and globalization of the 'visual banker'." The result was stunning to look at, while supporting IBM's message. A few short years ago, such ambitious effects were not within the budget of even a high-end corporate video production. Now, the technology of visual effects has progressed to the point where, as Churchill puts it, "you can do anything." You have the tools. You have the power. Just make sure you use that power for good, instead of evil.
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