How did they even manage that?!

[mParadox]

So I'm watching or more to the point, nearly finishing up with the Borgias.

A brilliant series by the way. Go watch it. O.O

Anywho, so while I'm soaking in the beautiful and nerve soothing, voice of Jeremy Irons, one thing that strikes me about this series or any series concerning the illustrious past, is the set pieces. How everything has been copied to replicate the past Italy. It's absolutely mind blowing.

Or if you need a more popular example, the armoury used in the Games of Thrones. Plus the armours, it's all absolutely unbelievable... the amount of effort they put into is mind blowing.

[hr]

I'm now confused as to what I was going to ask so here are two questions.

A) Ever been over whelmed by the sheer thought of the effort production houses put into their series?

OR

Aii) Ever been overwhelmed by the sheer thought of the effort anyone put into anything?
2) Was your mind repeatedly blown when you delved deeper in and found out about the entire process used?

 

[Ieyke]

I have The Borgias, and I love AC2/B/R, and I WANT to watch The Borgias....but I can't make myself sit through the first two episodes....
>_<

 

[SckizoBoy]

A) Ever been over whelmed by the sheer thought of the effort production houses put into their series?

Yes: Waterloo, which included drafting in 15000 soldiers of the then Soviet Union, training them in the style of Napoleonic-era armies, training a fifth of them (more or less) to fire muskets in line, fire artillery, ride/charge in formation (armed with either sabres or lances). Granted, being soldiers already, this would've been quite an excursion, but bloody hell, what a wardrobe. All of them were kitted out with French/Prussian/British uniforms (with accuracies regarding appropriate services within the armies) and would march into a warehouse and all be out the other side changed and 'equipped' a quarter of an hour later.

Granted, this was a film, so not sure if that counts in your book.

 

[King of Asgaard]

Cowboy Bebop, in a nutshell.
The level of quality in every aspect is brilliant.
Seriously, zone out during a fight scene and look at the animation. It's spectacular.
Same thing for the film's animation, shame it's nowhere near as good as the series.

And while I'm on the subject of animation, Akira.
Like, honestly, AKIRA.

 

[sextus the crazy]

Cowboy Bebop, in a nutshell.
The level of quality in every aspect is brilliant.
Seriously, zone out during a fight scene and look at the animation. It's spectacular.
Same thing for the film's animation, shame it's nowhere near as good as the series.

And while I'm on the subject of animation, Akira.
Like, honestly, AKIRA.

These two. Also, Madoka Magica. Not only is the animation beautiful and detailed, it often changes to different styles while still remaining striking and memorable.

 

[Ninjat_126]

Akira, Ghost in the Shell, most good animated films. The amount of time and effort put into the smallest things.

Akira, in particular, had massive beautifully detailed skylines used not for backgrounds, but for the backgrounds of backgrounds.

 

[Yassen]

Not sure if this is relevant or not, but there's a scene in the first Iron Man that I can't figure out how they pulled off. Remember that scene where he replaces the minature arc reactor and he has that hole in his chest that Pepper reaches in to?

Does anyone have a clue how they did that? It looked completely real.

 

[The Wykydtron]

I think any really good anime can pull this off. Recently Hyouka had the most amazing animation quality, art style and camerawork I have ever seen. So good.

TTGL can come too. Y'know they spent half their budget on the ending episode alone? Way to avoid another Evangelion Gainex!

I'm just reading Medaka Box (re-reading technically but it's been like 2 years since I stopped so it's practically new) and it's so fucking good. The writer has some serious badass villian skill ideas on a permanent conveyor belt of awesomeness I swear. So writing talent I guess?

Badass one-liners all day as well.

"Just try it! I'm not the type to die from being killed!"

Pre battle lines ftw.

Ummmmm the Baka to Test series were pretty good as well, the unique art style and humour was amazing. Love how they fade the animations into black and while anime style for a few lines of dialogue, usually between the two main guys in the group (yes I fucking forgot their names :/) for dramatic effect and subsequent comedy when one fucks over the other for the 50 hyperbillionth time.

EDIT: How the hell did I forget Persona 4? Everything in that game is so well thought out with subtle things underneath that i'm still only just noticing every playthrough. The characters are so awesome, the boss designs are epic and don't even get me started on the actual story.

It's just the best mystery story ever made ever. Nothin' special or anythin'

 

[mParadox]

I have The Borgias, and I love AC2/B/R, and I WANT to watch The Borgias....but I can't make myself sit through the first two episodes....
>_<

You simply must! It's highly awesome and very very good watching.

Worth the two hours. <.<

 

[TIMESWORDSMAN]

Peter Jackson had an actual Hobbiton built and lived in for a year, just to make the sets look homely.

'S pretty neat.

 

[Reece Borgars]

if anyone recently watched derren brown apocalypse - that took a lot of preparation and months of working on little things to lead one man to believe there was an imminent danger to the earth before placing him in a custom-built apocalypse. its a brilliant stunt when you realise how perfect they had to make everything for it to work.
And it gets better; even after he's placed in this post-apocalyptic world they continued to subtly manipulate his actions through various actors or objects. Also, its quite clever how they had managed to draw a lot of parallels between the events in apocalypse and in the wizard of oz, such as him developing courage, compassion and sharp, intelligent decision making skills through his journey (as well as the whole moral of the story being somewhat similar)
definitely worth watching (as are most big budget derren brown stunts)

 

[Klumpfot]

There's an episode of the X-files called "Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose", and I swear to Bog that it has the tightest, most awesomely bestest script of all time, in terms of just how meticulously crafted it is. It's as if they spent hours on every line of dialogue; twisting, turning, molding and restructuring it to be as perfect as it could be.

It's beautiful.

As for overall dedication to detail and authenticity, has anyone of you heard of Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa?

 

[Gearhead mk2]

if anyone recently watched derren brown apocalypse - that took a lot of preparation and months of working on little things to lead one man to believe there was an imminent danger to the earth before placing him in a custom-built apocalypse. its a brilliant stunt when you realise how perfect they had to make everything for it to work.
And it gets better; even after he's placed in this post-apocalyptic world they continued to subtly manipulate his actions through various actors or objects. Also, its quite clever how they had managed to draw a lot of parallels between the events in apocalypse and in the wizard of oz, such as him developing courage, compassion and sharp, intelligent decision making skills through his journey (as well as the whole moral of the story being somewhat similar)
definitely worth watching (as are most big budget derren brown stunts)

Sorry to go off topic here, but personally, I find that whole idea disgusting. They took one guy, screwed with his psyche and perception of reality for god knows how long to convince him the end of the world is nigh, then dumped him in a closed-off area with a bunch of actors pretending it's after the end, and for what? A freaking reality show. Seriously, it's like the Truman Show. And what'll happen to his psyche once they tell him "We were just screwing with you for tv, there's no apocolypse, now go back to your normal life."?

 

[Dr. Cakey]

Cowboy Bebop, in a nutshell.
The level of quality in every aspect is brilliant.
Seriously, zone out during a fight scene and look at the animation. It's spectacular.
Same thing for the film's animation, shame it's nowhere near as good as the series.

And while I'm on the subject of animation, Akira.
Like, honestly, AKIRA.

These two. Also, Madoka Magica. Not only is the animation beautiful and detailed, it often changes to different styles while still remaining striking and memorable.

Now that I've watched Madoka for the third time, there are times - particularly early on - where there's...I wouldn't say lazy animation, but distortions and off-model moments. That's not a criticism (well, it is a criticism), just a fact of necessity outstripping budget.

That aside, the sheer mass of work put into Madoka Magica is astounding. Holy hell, go to the PMMM wiki and see how they break apart the witch's labyrinths piece by piece. Oh look, here's this random German text they put on the wall.

The cinematography is also excellent, of course. They use disconcerting jump cuts to people's faces or to scenery to keep conversations interesting and slightly uncomfortable. They use some repeated images to tie episodes together. Oh, and the end of episode seven is basically my favorite scene in anything, ever. Period. The use of visuals is just amazing.

EDIT: Also the music.

 

[sextus the crazy]

Cowboy Bebop, in a nutshell.
The level of quality in every aspect is brilliant.
Seriously, zone out during a fight scene and look at the animation. It's spectacular.
Same thing for the film's animation, shame it's nowhere near as good as the series.

And while I'm on the subject of animation, Akira.
Like, honestly, AKIRA.

These two. Also, Madoka Magica. Not only is the animation beautiful and detailed, it often changes to different styles while still remaining striking and memorable.

Now that I've watched Madoka for the third time, there are times - particularly early on - where there's...I wouldn't say lazy animation, but distortions and off-model moments. That's not a criticism (well, it is a criticism), just a fact of necessity outstripping budget.

That aside, the sheer mass of work put into Madoka Magica is astounding. Holy hell, go to the PMMM wiki and see how they break apart the witch's labyrinths piece by piece. Oh look, here's this random German text they put on the wall.

The cinematography is also excellent, of course. They use disconcerting jump cuts to people's faces or to scenery to keep conversations interesting and slightly uncomfortable. They use some repeated images to tie episodes together. Oh, and the end of episode seven is basically my favorite scene in anything, ever. Period. The use of visuals is just amazing.

EDIT: Also the music.

Random german? you don't mean the text from "faust" which was placed to reinforce the fact that PMMM is a faustian tragedy, do you?

Also, that fight scene at the end of 7 was so fucking striking.

 

[Dangit2019]

The Russian Ark. Filmed entirely in the Winter Palace of the Russian State Hermitage Museum using a single 96-minute Steadicam sequence shot. 33 rooms of the museum, which are filled with a cast of over 2,000 actors and 3 orchestras, showing periods from over 300 years of Russian history...

... All in a single take.
And it is probably the most beautiful live action film you will ever see.

I've heard about that. It was brought up as a good example of long-shot film making in light of the horrible "Silent House" which just inserted an obvious cut every once in a while and wasn't nearly as impressive (having just a girl walking around with something loud happening every once in a while).

What's funny about Russian Ark is that it only took 3 takes.