Because major Awards bodies still think in 20th century terms, it’s unlikely Andy Serkis will get the Oscar nomination he deserves for Rise of the Planet of the Apes. There seems to be confusion over whether digital make-up does too much work for the actor, and I can understand that thinking. However, when it comes to Rise of the Planet of the Apes and Serkis’ performance as Caesar, that thinking is absolutely wrong and a new behind-the-scenes video proves it. If anything, the video shows WETA’s incredible special effects almost struggling to keep up with the actor rather than embellishing his performance.
If you had any doubt as to whether or not Serkis deserves an Oscar nomination for his performance, hit the jump to check out this video. Oscar nominations will be announced on January 24th at 8:38 AM (EST).
Video via Hitfix.
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Easily the most memorable performance for me this year. I’d love to see him get a nod of some sort. He deserves it.
How could they not laugh???
It’s called acting.
He deserves the nomination and the award. This clip of him exceeds the CGI.
Look at the side by side still, Serkis’s facial expressions are way over the top compared to the animated version. The animators cleaned up his performance quite a bit, so if Serkis is nominated so should the animators that worked on that character.
James Franco, Frida Pinto, and the great Brian Cox should also be nominated for not laughing during that take.
You are completely missing the point here my friend. If it wasn’t for Andy’s performance, the animators wouldn’t have much to go by or for that fact, nothing at all. And I’m willing to bet that the animators would disagree with you completely. It’s his performance alone. Yes of course the facial expressions aren’t 100% the same, thats a given. But all the physical movement and the eyes are perfect. I think he should get the nomination. What other actor can do that?
Exactly, it’s the emotion (acting) of the performance, as well as the physical that makes his work great.
Slap a fake nose on Nicole Kidman and you have Oscar gold, slap some pixels on top of Andy an suddenly it’s all high falutin’ hocus pocus nonsense!
They would have their own imagination, reference they themselves could have generated as many feature animators do such as Jeff Gabor at Blue Sky who has some excellent examples of just such behind the scenes footage of himself doing all of this for his own shots available on vimeo. There are animators that worked on Rise that also have their animation reels available on vimeo for viewing that have many keyframe only shots i.e. none of the mocap was used or shots where only parts of that available data was used. Andy gave some tremendous reference and motion data to be sure but it wasn’t for the benefit of helpless animators.
Both the digital artists and actor should get acclaim although I felt like the performance was ridiculous and I can’t take the movie seriously because of it. But the digital art (cg) looked mostly good.
Here is some more behind the scenes footage regarding bringing Caesar to the screen.
Jeffrey Engel’s animation reel
http://vimeo.com/12630822
Phillip To’s animation reel
http://vimeo.com/34776466
keep in mind that when they note “keyframed animation” without noting motion capture as well that there is in fact no motion capture information used.
I would never try to steal anyone’s thunder in creating a performance, and I’m sure these guys wouldn’t as well, I just wish a select few had the same amount of respect for artists such as these gents.
Seems a shame Serkis can’t even get a nomination but Nicole Kidman wins an Oscar for having a stupid nose glued to her face. Although thinking about it, I think the prosthetic deserved the win for covering up some of that annoying face of hers.
Just look at the still they chose. Those movements, those emotions in the final product are not solely his- they are the animators’ who worked on those shots.
For example, look up “Jeffrey Engel Character Animation Reel” on Vimeo, he animated parts of that scene entirely by hand…
Makeup artists, while amazing, don’t change the expression or performance of an actor, they do that themselves. Performance capture is not “digital makeup,” instead it is a collaborative process that does not end when the actor leaves the set.
I could pull off what Serkis does here. Nothing Oscar worthy.
ohh bull shit. Right, like you could. And i bet you can say that for ever other actor then. He deserves the nomination.
Just think of it this way, who deserves the credit for the painting of The Mona Lisa? The model who posed for the painting, or Leonardo DaVinci who painted it? Do they both deserve equal credit? What if it was a self portrait? As stated above, some animators use their own performances as starting off points and sometimes they use actors as reference. In the end, the animator’s interpretation of the acting is what you see. Like a painter, he takes the “model” and re-presents it using his artistic skill.
It’s not as black and white as Andy Serkis wants it to be.
you don’t really “get” motion capture do you?
what andy serkis does while all the markers are placed on him: THAT is the performance. if you were to watch the making of a performance capture movie you would see that the actors are acting out the scenes (and in most cases delivering dialogue) while their digital representation is watched on a nearby screen by the crew. what they do, that’s what shows up. Then after that there’s a long process where that digital representation is fully animated with detail. But that doesn’t change the fact that at the root of this is an acted performance.
i’ve had some friends major in film who took lots of acting classes, and there is an entire discipline called “movement”. my friend also took a class on “clowning”, which is almost exactly what it sounds like. the whole idea is to be expressive with your body. it’s a big part of acting.
So to your awful analogy about the Mona Lisa, i would submit to you that Andy Serkis did not just sit there. There are probably tons of acting professionals who would consider a great silent motion capture performance to be the epitome of great acting.
Colin,
I DO know how motion capture works and you said it yourself after the performance is captured, there’s a long process where the performance must be tweeked, adjusted, and many things are even thrown out by an animator as unusable. Most animators (if not all) have taken acting lessons, in order to hone their craft. The art of animation is the art of motion itself. Animation is to capturing motion and performance, what Painting is to capturing a likeness. Animators put the soul into what they animate. That’s what the word “anima” is in the word “animation”.
I know this because I’ve studied all my life attempting to perform this form of art. I happen to be a professional animator. What Serkis is doing for live action movies now a days, is no different than what the actors who gave their performance as reference did in Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Peter Pan back in the day. In fact, they still do it, even to this day. Back then it was just as easy to capture a performance by tracing stills of the actors, called “rotoscoping”. If you watch a rotoscoped movie, you can tell because the movement looks a bit creepy. Like the animated LORD OF THE RINGS movie, directed by Ralph Baksi. The best animators knew how to best use rotoscope and embellish it so it looks just right.
My problem is not Serkis’ performance, my problem is the false assumption that there is no human animator doing the thankless job of working within his chosen art form in order to have that performance come through in an animated puppet that is proportioned in such a way that a one to one representation cannot be made.
And by the way, there are not sensors on Serkis’ face. The face was all hand animated by the artist using Serkis as the reference. If any of Serkis’ performance rings true to the audience, it was because an animator did a darn good job.
Serkis should get credit for his performance. The animator should get credit for making sure it came through in the final product. They BOTH would therefore deserve an award.
Here’s a link to “An open letter to Andy Serkis” by Tim Borelli, which starts off with:
“Dear Mr. Serkis,
If you deserve to be considered for an Academy Award nomination for Acting in regards to your performance motion capture, then every animator who has ever animated a character in any movie deserves consideration as well.
Sincerely,
Tim Borrelli
P.S., Let me clarify:
Recently, you have been quoted as claiming that performance capture actors deserve to be considered for the Academy Awards in Acting categories…
Before I even start, let me say that I feel that you are a great actor. I don’t doubt your acting ability, both on stage and on film. But that’s not the debate here….”
To continue reading Google: “Open letter to Andy Serkis by Tim Borrelli”.
It’s worth reading. Especially since Serkis is misrepresenting the animation process.
If the makers of Rise of the Apes used traditional make up effects ala the Tim Burton version instead of motion capture and Serkis played the same character and gave the same performance there would be no talk of an Oscar nomination.
If they nominate him, they have to nominate all the animators who contributed to the performance.
All credits aside, Has anyone ever been nominated for playing something other then a human being? I mean acting and animating aside, it would more of a statement about animal consciousness then it would anything else. IMO.