The problem with Andy Serkis (or any actor that disregards Visual Effects Animators) when it comes t

<click on image to go to actual article>

I am glad that more and more influential people are speaking out despite Andy Serkis's claim that all the performance is credited to him and him alone when it comes to characters like Gollum, King Kong or Caesar.

This is utterly ridiculous.

It's very simple. The characters that are portrayed by Andy Serkis all have different physical attributes than the actor. This means they have different arm length, weight and maneuverability and this can only be rendered as a result by the artists when it is up on screen.

For example, King Kong appears to be about 25 feet tall in a crouch--about seven times the height of an actual silverback gorilla. At that size, a very rough estimate tells us Kong would weigh anywhere from 20 to 60 tons. (from google search)

How the hell would Andy Serkis be able the create that weight with acting?

Do you know how hard animators work and study to be able to make a huge silverback gorilla that weighs 20 to 60 tons move believably on film?

Or Gollum or Caesar for that matter.

Do you know how subtle the animators have to make the eyebrows twitch and change the shape of mouth and cheek muscles to almost millimeter precision?

These are all decisions animators have to make and work countless late nights to achieve what you see on screen.

I know Andy Serkis is a great actor. And, I'm not trying to take anything away from him.

But why does he want to take everything away from the animators then?

<click on image to go to actual article>

This is what I have a problem with.

Actors aren't stupid. They know when they see a film or any result on screen that there is no way this could have been possible by themselves alone.

Then why would Andy Serkis say this?

Why would he hurt the dozens and hundreds of hard-working people that have helped make such memorable moments in cinema?

I don't know.

I don't know him personally, so I'm not going to jump to any conclusions.

I will say that actors, especially when doing mo-cap(motion-capture) should be more respectable to the medium and it's contributors.

Because actors like this will only brew bad blood and contribute in making a more toxic environment in this already drama-intense industry that is Hollywood.

Be nice to other people and work hard. That's all I have to say.

- David Jang -

#characteranimator #VFX #visualeffects #andyserkis #planetoftheapes #kingkong #gollum #VFXanimators #mocap #motioncapture #cginsuftry #cgindustry #vfxindustry