Originally posted by mdc3000
While I was enjoying the ad, nothing was a ****ing cool as when the Agent jumps on the car... I couldn't help but yell out "**** yeah!"... that shot has got my ass in the theatre come may....

MATT

Originally posted by DVD Smurf
I really liked Matrix for its story and its philosophy. The question is whether they can get something that remarkable in a sequel, and if it can measure up with the first film. Sure the fight sequence looked very action packed, but fight is a fight. However, it is the story that makes the film.

Originally posted by torrance
the cgi people looks really weird. i really liked the fact that humans were humans in the first one -- no cgi stuntmen, or whatever. it never looks good enough.

about this virtual cinematagrophy, could someone post more info on it? never heard of it before now.

The effects whiz is especially giddy today, because he finally gets to tell an outsider about “virtual cinematography,” his team’s big invention for the sequels, which will make bullet time look like finger painting. Welcoming his guest inside, he begins by apologizing for any ruckus that might occur downstairs. “We’re blowing up sentinels today,” he says. Twenty minutes later, a distant voice cries out, “Fire in the hole!” Gaeta pauses for a few seconds. Silence. So he resumes talking. The next instant, a deafening blast sends him (and his interviewer) ducking for cover. A tinkling sound showers the outer wall of his office. “Did you hear that?” he asks, delighted. “I think that was debris!” Gaeta laughs. “Welcome to the war zone.”



Virtual cinematography wipes out the line in the sand between what is real and what looks like the work of a computer. “Anyone who watches movies or TV or just lives their life is the ultimate expert in realism,” Gaeta says. “You know when things are fake. You can just sense it.” But not anymore. Remember that fight scene in “Reloaded” between Neo and the 100 Agent Smiths? Obviously, only one of those Agent Smiths is the real actor, Hugo Weaving—but you won’t be able to tell which one. The other 99, all digital creations, are three-dimensional, photo-realistic copies. They’re not just close approximations. They’re perfect. Their hair ripples, their faces contort, their bodies twist and fight. Now, if Gaeta and his team can create virtual humans, then they can create virtual anything: rooms, vehicles, you name it. And they have. And you’ll never know.
The refreshing thing about virtual cinematography is that it starts out with the genuine article. “We try to base everything on real actors and real objects,” says Gaeta. “It’s a very strong philosophical view that Larry and Andy and all of us share.” Here’s a gross oversimplification of how it works. Using five high-resolution digital cameras strong enough to pick up details like pores and follicles, Gaeta’s team will record an actor’s performance. This process is called universal capture, or u-cap. The team then feeds the information from all five cameras into a computer, and a complex algorithm calculates the actor’s appearance from every single angle the cameras missed. “Once we have the master performance captured,” Gaeta explains, “we can actually use it to create an event, like a martial-arts fight. But it could be anything.” Like, for example, a scene in which Neo flies at 2,000mph through a metropolis—which is what you’re looking at on the cover of this magazine.

[Source]