SIGGRAPH keynote speaker Glenn Entis talks about future of graphics

Remember Glenn Entis? Academy-Award-winning senior VP and chief visual and technical officer for EA Games? Made that little remark a while ago about Final Fantasy? He was invited as one of three keynote speakers for SIGGRAPH and his speech had some interesting insights to offer.

Basically his points were a much more lucid and detailed version of the thoughts he had always expressed about the gaming industry, and this time he also compares it to the film industry. He also brought up the same point he made when he cited FF as an example, that graphics with more polygons lose their realism when their motions wasn’t as realistic.

It’s when a character’s visual appearance suggests a certain experience of life, but when their movement falls short of that expectation, the character feels like the undead. […] Just adding polygons makes it worse. We must be able to believe what characters do, think and feel, but we must also believe how they response to unpredictable input.

He explained his point by citing the less-than-fluid motions of muppets and characters from “Final Fantasy: the Spirits Within.” Basically his point is that the 3D modelling is stunning, but it loses its realism when it starts to move because the motions look fake.

He also compares this with graphics in film and has high hopes for graphics in video games. He says that while “graphics in film are nearing the plateau but the best thrill moments are yet to come in gaming.” He says this in light of the fact that graphics in films aren’t real time. It’s pre-rendered and doesn’t need any processing once it’s being shown. Video games, on the other hand, demand control from gamers: control of their character, control of their environment, and control of tools.

While he believes that it’s impossible for real-time graphics that video games thrive on to match the pre-rendered beauty of graphics in films, there will come a time where the differences will be so small it will be imperceptible. Imagine controlling the “Transformers” as beautifully rendered and fluid as they appeared in the movie. Now that’s the future of graphics.

He sums up his thoughts best as he says “Gaming has made the fastest improvements in graphics, but what is exciting is that we still have the furthest way to go. That’s phenomenally exciting.”

Via Develop

Remember Glenn Entis? Academy-Award-winning senior VP and chief visual and technical officer for EA Games? Made that little remark a while ago about Final Fantasy? He was invited as one of three keynote speakers for SIGGRAPH and his speech had some interesting insights to offer.

Basically his points were a much more lucid and detailed version of the thoughts he had always expressed about the gaming industry, and this time he also compares it to the film industry. He also brought up the same point he made when he cited FF as an example, that graphics with more polygons lose their realism when their motions wasn’t as realistic.

It’s when a character’s visual appearance suggests a certain experience of life, but when their movement falls short of that expectation, the character feels like the undead. […] Just adding polygons makes it worse. We must be able to believe what characters do, think and feel, but we must also believe how they response to unpredictable input.

He explained his point by citing the less-than-fluid motions of muppets and characters from “Final Fantasy: the Spirits Within.” Basically his point is that the 3D modelling is stunning, but it loses its realism when it starts to move because the motions look fake.

He also compares this with graphics in film and has high hopes for graphics in video games. He says that while “graphics in film are nearing the plateau but the best thrill moments are yet to come in gaming.” He says this in light of the fact that graphics in films aren’t real time. It’s pre-rendered and doesn’t need any processing once it’s being shown. Video games, on the other hand, demand control from gamers: control of their character, control of their environment, and control of tools.

While he believes that it’s impossible for real-time graphics that video games thrive on to match the pre-rendered beauty of graphics in films, there will come a time where the differences will be so small it will be imperceptible. Imagine controlling the “Transformers” as beautifully rendered and fluid as they appeared in the movie. Now that’s the future of graphics.

He sums up his thoughts best as he says “Gaming has made the fastest improvements in graphics, but what is exciting is that we still have the furthest way to go. That’s phenomenally exciting.”

Via Develop