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Ender wrote: 2017-12-07 10:06pm

Abacus wrote: 2017-11-29 08:52am

Ender wrote: 2017-11-29 01:24amHe can't frame a shot to save his life, he doesn't have remotely the creative visual flair for Star Wars...

You did see The Avengers (2012), yes?

Yeah. That's exactly what I was thinking of when I was listing why he was bad. Compare the shots of Man of Steel with Avengers. For his multitude other faults, Snyder can do the basic composition that Wheldon cannot

Uh, yeah, no. MoS was garbage in comparison.

Abacus wrote: 2017-12-08 08:08am

Ender wrote: 2017-12-07 10:06pm

Abacus wrote: 2017-11-29 08:52am

You did see The Avengers (2012), yes?

Yeah. That's exactly what I was thinking of when I was listing why he was bad. Compare the shots of Man of Steel with Avengers. For his multitude other faults, Snyder can do the basic composition that Wheldon cannot

Uh, yeah, no. MoS was garbage in comparison.

Abacus, you do realise he's taking about a specific aspect of film-making rather than the films over all, yes?

Now as a complete amateur, I don't really know anything about film composition and how to judge what is technically good. And I remember specific shots in Avengers I thought were awesome though. (The team circle shot, the big oner in the fight) I don't remember anything like that in Man Of Steel.

Ender - Do you mind elaborating on makes good and bad composition?

Man of Steel was the first comic book movie in a long time whose action scenes I found actually impressive. Faora taking down US soldiers with super speed, that big Kryptonian jumping on A-10, Faora/big guy/Superman brawl, Zod and Superman fight at the end of the movie...
The only fight that seemed superflous and not well thought out was the World Engine tentacles vs Superman which should've been cut and replaced with perhaps a slow scene of Superman entering the machine and crawling towards the reactor as the Kryptionian environment weakens him or something like that.

In contrast I can't remember a single fight scene from either Avengers that I found impressive except maybe Hulk smashing Loki around but that was more about the humor of the situation rather than actually being a well thought out action scene.
The big ending of the first Avengers is them taking on hordes of useless grunts and wiping the floor with them. The big ending of the second Avengers was them taking on hordes of useless robots and wiping the floor with them in slow motion while camera circles around.
Imagine if the big ending of Terminator 2 was T-101 fighting hordes of bikers that arrived at the steel mill to avenge their buddy from the beginning and then we are treated to the slow motion of Arnie wiping the floor with them. That's how little thought goes into creating action scenes for these movies that, at their core, are supposed to be action movies.

Crazedwraith wrote: 2017-12-08 08:16am

Abacus wrote: 2017-12-08 08:08am

Ender wrote: 2017-12-07 10:06pm

Yeah. That's exactly what I was thinking of when I was listing why he was bad. Compare the shots of Man of Steel with Avengers. For his multitude other faults, Snyder can do the basic composition that Wheldon cannot

Uh, yeah, no. MoS was garbage in comparison.

Abacus, you do realise he's taking about a specific aspect of film-making rather than the films over all, yes?

Now as a complete amateur, I don't really know anything about film composition and how to judge what is technically good. And I remember specific shots in Avengers I thought were awesome though. (The team circle shot, the big oner in the fight) I don't remember anything like that in Man Of Steel.

Ender - Do you mind elaborating on makes good and bad composition?

I would say that even the particularly memorable shots in the Avengers weren't that great as visuals themselves, but because of their emotional context. The team circle shot in particular is the climax of the moviec, the point where the protagonists previously intractable individual problems become solvable because they've become a team, earned by the process of them working out their differences over the course of the film. Puny god works because its the final refutation of Loki's conceit of being a superior being.

Contrast that to Snyder's work, which is visually impressive but tends to be forgetable because they tend to mean so little in terms of storytelling or character.

Crazedwraith wrote: 2017-12-08 08:16am

Abacus wrote: 2017-12-08 08:08am

Ender wrote: 2017-12-07 10:06pm

Yeah. That's exactly what I was thinking of when I was listing why he was bad. Compare the shots of Man of Steel with Avengers. For his multitude other faults, Snyder can do the basic composition that Wheldon cannot

Uh, yeah, no. MoS was garbage in comparison.

Abacus, you do realise he's taking about a specific aspect of film-making rather than the films over all, yes?

Now as a complete amateur, I don't really know anything about film composition and how to judge what is technically good. And I remember specific shots in Avengers I thought were awesome though. (The team circle shot, the big oner in the fight) I don't remember anything like that in Man Of Steel.

Ender - Do you mind elaborating on makes good and bad composition?

They aren't on netflix anymore so I can't screencap and do comparisons. But Coop has the right of it - Snyder is much stronger at visual shots than anything else. I basically think of his style as he comes up with really nice shots and then tries to build the the movie around those individual shots. Which is why the movies are god awful, they are supposed to be more than the sum of their parts, and are instead just godawful because it is random shit getting to the next shot.

Whereas Wheldon is bad at the visuals, but he is much better at overall pacing so when you reach those cresendo moments, it hits. However, his characterization and emotional investment that got you there is basically the filmatic equivalent of cotten candy, and the sugar rush will wear off and memory of the emotional investment doesn't stick.

Basically, if you want to do a quick contrast, freeze Avengers when Cap is directing the cops on top of the taxi, and Man of Steel when Superman looks up at Zod as he realizes his full "Kryptonian on earth" power. Both are the points of the film where the character is hitting their defining moment, where they face their greatest challenge and are revealing their true character (Cap as an empathic leader, Supes as well the less said of his characterization the better)

Cap is wedged over on the left, and cops in the forefront. Most of the frame is empty background showing the later greenscreened in devestation. Focus is on the cops and their response, lighting on Cap is not great, lot of shadow. Tries for rule of thirds but doesn't quite nail it, mainly because of how much open space he saved for the CGI.

Supes is centered, well lit, , devestation in the background is a haze, tight shot on his face where you see him swallow his fear and become determined. Good use of static composition.


Example of someone who blends the strengths of these two together well btw would be Rami's Act 2 fight/train scene in Spider-Man 2. Good visual direction, lots of use of dynamic composition, emotional investment and catharsis.

But anyway, strong visual direction and shot composition are not the same as a good movie. If they were, everyone would love Attack of the Clones, where Lucas does some great work with visual metaphor, but instead all we talk about is that damn "sand gets everywhere" line.

Thanks for the explanation Ender. It would be interesting to hear what you thought of Justice League since both Synder and Whedon worked on it.

From the Visual Dictionary:

Tech / military strength stuff:
Spoiler Spoiler tags on this forum software seem broken so I can't post the other stuff without new posts.

I'm thinking that we should move any and all spoilers (since reviews are starting to come in) to a new thread.

Crazedwraith wrote: 2017-12-09 12:13pm Thanks for the explanation Ender. It would be interesting to hear what you thought of Justice League since both Synder and Whedon worked on it.

Have not seen it, have zero intention to. Honestly I'm about done for all the superhero/monolithic nerd franchise stuff.

Ace Pace wrote: 2017-12-10 07:20am I'm thinking that we should move any and all spoilers (since reviews are starting to come in) to a new thread.

can the links to the thread be posted here?

PhoenixKnig wrote: 2017-12-10 01:16pm

Ace Pace wrote: 2017-12-10 07:20am I'm thinking that we should move any and all spoilers (since reviews are starting to come in) to a new thread.

can the links to the thread be posted here?

Sure, if you can't look in the parent forum, it's right here.