Cinema screens are huge, which is odd, because the eye can only focus on a small portion of what’s in front of it at any one time. That’s what prompted the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to team up with eye-tracking firm Tobii and neuroscientists from Birkbeck, University of London. The trio embarked upon a project to determine where in the movie people concentrated their gaze. Then, by using Tobii’s hardware, were able to create a heat map that can be overlaid on the frame, much in the same way that SMI analyzes sports matches. The conclusions from the research aren’t particularly surprising, but does confirm a long-held suspicion that people’s innate ability to detect and ignore fakery hasn’t diminished, even in an era of photo-realistic CGI.
Analyzing a scene from Iron Man 2 with director Jon Favreau, he commented that the audience’s attention was directed straight towards those on-screen moments with practical action. That is, people totally blanked the huge sweeping vistas of “Monaco,” (in fact, a car park in Downey, California), the river and the crowds. Instead, they focused on things that were “real,” like Gwyneth Paltrow’s face*, Mickey Rourke’s body and the model F1 car that was blown up for the scene.
“Everything that you’re looking at is real, and everything that you’re not looking at is fake.”
Perhaps this will help convince directors that practical, old-school effects are worth investing in, and will turn the tide against glossy, unrealistic CGI. It’s an issue that Favreau is wrestling on his forthcoming remake of The Jungle Book, saying that the reason that motion capture films — like The Polar Express and The Adventures of Tintin — don’t work, is that the uncanny valley make faces too unbelievable. That’s why he’s going to be using real actors’ heads to help his audience not feel too unsettled. If you’re curious to see the clip with heat map and commentary, it’s the first one down at the source.
*No jokes, now.
[Image Credit: AMPAS / Marvel / Tobii]
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Science, HD
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Via: Wired
Source: Oscars.org