Paul

Paul like Ted is a great representation of using motion capture and green screening to create a CG character in a comedy movie. What interests me about this film is that they did this the complete opposite to Ted by making Seth Rogen act in front of a green screen with a motion capture suit on and then the live actors/actresses would act without Seth Rogen but they would act with a stick or a figure of Paul as reference. To capture the movements and facial features of Seth Rogen they would input the videos from his performance in front of the green screen into the actual film then animate off that. What surprised me was that the animators put so much effort into making Paul and making him look realistic that they would take so much time just figuring out how and when he should blink and if it was appropriate to blink at a certain point in the movie.

         

Ted

The film Ted is a great way to show how you can use motion capture technology in a comedy movie, and in this video above it shows how they did it and how Seth Macfarlane (voice of Ted) created the character. I like this movie because it comes to show how far we've gone in technology by making a teddy bear come to live and have realistic movements as a human. Seth Macfarlane created Ted by placing on a motion capture suit and using is own movements as reference for Ted as well as using his voice, he also acted out Ted's scenes at the same time as the live actors/actresses so that it would make it easier for the live actors/actresses to react to Ted and his movements.

 

Mirrors Edge

Mirrors Edge is a great first person free running game where you go around the city roof tops parkouring and fighting bad guys, which some of the bad guys can actually parkour as well so they can keep up with you. This game doesn't have the best story and when it's in a cut scene the graphics change to a comic book like look, which in my opinion doesn't really work. However, Mirrors Edge makes up for that by having a great landscape/architecture you can run through in FIRST PERSON view which is amazing because it makes you feel like your actually free running yourself.

With the fighting in this game it's not the best, but you can counter the enemies attacks and hit them back with their own guns. Also there is an achievement in this game where you have to go through the game without killing any enemies but you can disarm them if you like. A great thing about Mirrors Edge is that you can time yourself in the chapters of the game and then go back and see if you can beat your own time, or you can do time trials which you go round an obstacle course and race against your friends and see who is faster. I'll give this game an 8/10 and I highly recommend it if you like a challenge and racing through cities.      

The Last of Us

The Last of Us is in my opinion one of the best stories ever told in a video game. This it because the characters are so powerful and have great development throughout the story. For instance 'Joel' the main character, he goes from loosing his daughter, gaining 'Ellie' and becoming overly protective towards her, to then trusting her with a gun and letting go of her and becoming a father to her.

It's also a great game because of the environment your playing in is so beautiful but yet so creepy and unnerving. This is because at any point in the game an infected (zombie like creature) could jump out at you and kill you. Another reason the environment is so good is that throughout the game you can find equipment which can upgrade your weapon, but there are few resources so you can't be trigger finger happy, you have to really think whether you want to shoot an infected or to quietly sneak past them.

Finally, The Last of Us focuses more on the single player than it does on the multiplayer which in my opinion is better because not many people have friends that like playing horror games so they won't buy this game. Also I feel that these days many games are focusing on multiplayer because thats what social gamers want, but if your like me and just want a game to play by yourself and has a great story I recommend this game because I give it a 9.5/10.    

Alight

'Alight' the name of this animation and directed by Jason Keyser is a great piece of animation because of its simplicity but yet capturing story and because of the emotions of the characters portray and how the audience will immediately feel for the characters. Another reason I like this animation is that the characters look child like,vulnerable and innocent, this shocks you even more when the water character gets crushed by the big mechanical monster. This leads to to feeling sorry for the fire character and backing him up when he starts fighting the mechanical monster because he's heart broken. I also like that in the end of the story it seems that the fire character gets turned into a human being but who also has a mechanical like skeleton or the mechanical monster turns into the human after the fire character destroys him, I don't really know but I'd like to think it's the first one I suggested.        

Big Hero 6

Big Hero 6 is another favourite animated films because of the environmental designs and because of the character design which to me it is cartoonish but bad ass as well. some cool things about this film is that some of the animators actually put them selves in the film as background civilians, and that Baymax's movements and posing was referenced and modeled from the movements of babies with full diapers.

Another cool thing about this film is that two cities were put together to create San Fransokyo, which is San Francisco and Tokyo combined. So in order to create the thousands of civilians living there, the production team invented a new program named "Denizen Factory",  which allowed the to build a whole series of background characters each with a distinct design.

In my opinion this film is great because of one character 'Baymax' because he acts like a really intelligent child but if he looses any air or run low on battery he becomes a drunken person, and it's always fun to watch a drunken person do tasks when someone else is trying to help them.