Is it just me or does the CGI look really bad for 2017?

Also... I'm willing to bet all your houses that this is a YA adaption.

/googles

yep

Looks better than almost any DC adaptation from Hollywood in the past few decades.

@ChaosEngine --

I've only seen one other piece by this dude, so I can't claim that I definitely "get" what he's going for, but... To me, his shtick is: "I wanted to be a rockstar / guitar hero when I was growing up, but my parents made me learn the piano instead of guitar. So, I'm going to live that rockstar dream via the piano instead of guitar, partially because I enjoy it, partially to stick it to mom and dad, and partially because other people seem to enjoy it as evidenced by views / likes / comments, etc." (And importantly, he can't play the guitar, so he uses the skill that he has available.)

I like his stuff (well, the 2 videos I've seen of his). This one is pretty reliant on bends, and to nitpick I think he should have used an analog pitch bender for that instead of the fancy touch digital one he had. On the other hand, it isn't too critical, and he seems to go for playing by ear without a lot of (maybe *any*?) practice run-throughs which would definitely be required to nail those bend sections perfectly. So, the imperfect on-hand equipment (digital vs analog) and imperfect execution don't detract much from the performance for me.

You're also correct that he played the wrong notes a few times, but in a musically acceptable way -- he was still playing chord notes in the scale and key of the song, but not exactly the same ones as in the original. So while I noticed it, that also doesn't really detract much from the performance for me either.

Taking a piece for another instrument and adapting it to a different one as opposed to trying to "imperfectly" emulate the original can also be very cool. Youtube covers of rock songs on a Korean Gayageum come to mind. BUT, I also get a kick out of my interpretation of this guy's shtick, and don't feel like he's trying to do the musical equivalent of forcing a round peg into a square hole or anything.

Definitely all subjective though.

Yes, you are 100% right in that he does a great job of getting about as close as possible to the sound of the guitar on a piano.

But I'm not questioning his playing ability, I'm questioning the choice to do it in the first place. Or more specifically, the choice to try and REPLICATE the sound of the original.

Here's what I would consider a good example of adapting a guitar piece to the piano. She's not trying to make the piano sound like a guitar, but using the piano to create a different version of this.

Or the other way round taking a famous piano piece and adapting it for guitar.

Obviously, art is a subjective thing and you're not "wrong" for liking or disliking this... I just feel like it doesn't really add anything to the original.

Also, since I'm posting unpopular opinions.. .he actually plays the wrong notes a few times... amateur

Well, yes, a guitar can do things that a piano can't and the pitch-shifter doesn't quite achieve the right timbre but the point is that he's adapted a piano to sound like a fairly convincing facsimile of an electric guitar; the playing of the piece is secondary to that. The achievement is how much the piano now sounds like an electric guitar, given how different the instruments are. It's not a bad version of that guitar solo, it's a good version of the solo considering it's being played on an instrument that's normally unsuitable for playing it.

I don't believe for one second that you could keep up that rate for a full minute, much less over 10. If you take the time it takes to aim a 300 yard shot accurately, you're talking 10-12 shots per minute.
Shooting with your finger at maximum speed is always far less accurate and slower than full auto with the same gun. You have to prove it to me that I'm wrong, because that's simple logic. Full auto is a more stable rate, so easier to adapt to, and doesn't require you to vibrate one hand, shaking the gun, dividing your attention, and tiring you out.
It's silly to imply the full auto functionality didn't exponentially raise the number both wounded and killed. Without the crowd, it might have made less difference. With the crowd, absolutely not imo.

What this company (snapperstech.com) did is put together an upgraded control "rig" to manipulate facial expressions, taking into account muscle limits and interactions, skin elasticity, etc.

A little more info in the video's YT desc :
-Adaptive rig: which allows combining any number of expressions using optimized list of blendshapes.
-Real facial muscles constraints: the advanced rig logic simulates real facial muscles constraints.
-Advanced skin shader (for Maya and Unreal): holds up to 16 wrinkles maps and 16 dynamic diffuse maps with micro details and pores stretching.
-Easy to manipulate using facial controllers and/or GUI.
-Compatible with all game engines and animation packages.
-Smooth transition between all the expressions.
-Adjustment layer: freeform manipulation of multiple regions of the face to create unlimited variations of the same expression.

The real-time rendering part is achieved by the Unreal engine itself. The final rendering performance still relies mainly on the hardware used.

"And if you prefer one or the other, I can adapt. Humans are good at that. ;-) "

No, they're not. Or did you miss the part where some of the smartest people on the planet crashed millions of dollars into another planet? People are TERRIBLE at these kinds of things. One conversion? Fine. Ten conversions? No problem. Hundreds, thousands or millions of conversions? The probability of error tends to 100%.

It would definitely be more efficient if everyone used one common language (especially for cross cultural endeavours such as business and engineering). In fact, that kinda happens by default and that language tends to be English.

However, there are practicalities in play. First up, there aren't just two languages, there are hundreds, and there is a broad split in the number of speakers of each language. Whereas in metric v imperal, the US is the ONLY country in the developed world that hangs onto imperial.

Second, learning a new language is an order of magnitude more work than changing to using metric.

I'm speaking from experience here; in the course of my life, I've studied Irish, French, German, Spanish and Japanese, and I am in no way close to fluent in any of them

On the other hand, when I left Ireland, it was officially metric but imperial was still common (distances were in KM, speed limits in miles, people used imperial weights for humans, metric for food). When I moved to NZ, everything is metric, and honestly, relearning happens without effort. Once you immerse yourself, you eventually just start thinking in the new system.


Finally, metric is just a better system for everything. There isn't a single scenario where imperial is a more useful measurement.

Come on America, join us. It's awesome and you don't really want to use "English" units, do you? Did you fight a war to get rid of them? What would George Washington say!? It's unamerican, I tells ya!

I've lived in the US since 2013 ... I'm OK now with instantly "translating" to miles and feet and pounds and gallons in colloquial speech (at work we all use metric because I'm in science and tech with international collaboration), but Temperature??? I'm still in Celsius and can't adapt seem to adapt.

Maybe there's no logical reason to have different systems but the reasons to have only one system are kind of thin. I am perfectly capable of using more than one system and I find that I prefer different systems for different uses. I can use imperial measurements when I build a shed and metric when I do engineering calculations. When I cook, I might use cups and tablespoons to make chili but I use grams to measure ingredients when I bake bread. And if you prefer one or the other, I can adapt. Humans are good at that. ;-)

Extend the argument and it's not logical for the world to speak more than one language. Translating between languages is a whole lot more work than translating temperature scales. We should all speak Mandarin, because it's the most spoken language in the world. But my best friend's 2 year old speaks Mandarin AND English. I suspect he'll be just fine.

Anyway, long story short, I agree we should all know how to use the metric system. That doesn't mean we all need to use it for everything.

I've seen most of the GitS material incl. the comics & anime. I actually found the Hollywood adaptation watchable.... because I placed it in its own little isolated corner and the lowest of expectations -- Hollywood, blockbuster, skin-deep sci-fi... and I came out much relieved it wasn't as bad as the critics said. At least I had a nostalgia blast from the visuals. My blockbuster movies watching has evolved into a state of "don't care to be angry/don't pay to watch at the theatre/ just wait them out to be on Netflix/clearance DVD BluRay)

Seriously... how can anyone expect anything of above average depth from a Hollywood blockbuster anymore? Don't be silly and set yourself up for disappointment.

I can totally understand their reasons for risk-aversion. From their perspective, they got burned too many times financially (not saying it's not their own doing) to make films that demand thoughtfulness from the audience. I just don't believe in Hollywood will give us anything deep anymore for these big budget films...

It was definitely dumbed down thematically though, especially from 1st/2nd GiG. While they were pretty pretentious (e.g. 'second order simulacra'), at least they were full of things to think about. The whole 'give consent' theme was as far as I can tell introduced in the adaptation and immensely cringe inducing.

What also irritated me is how they created a weird mish mash of the seperate Ghost in the Shell stories for no good reason. Why did they have to combine the 2nd GiG antagonist with the original movie's key plot scenes? It was just strange and unnecessary.

I don't at all mind the westernisation / white lead. Felt that controversy was nonsense. It's a Hollywood adaptation, why even bother remaking it if you're not going to have a new take on it or adapt it to be more familiar to local (American / English) audiences?

Same thing with the Netflix Death Note adapation. No idea if it will actually be any good but couldn't care less that they moved the location to the US and made the lead characters white. There are already multiple Japanese live action Death Note movies with Japanese leads. What's the point in another?

I liked the movie adaptation. That said, if you have seen the various iterations of Ghost in the Shell, they don't seem tied to any common theme other than the basic one of whether or not a person's ghost (soul,id) can remain intact in a body that is heavily changed with cybernetics. The live action movie held that theme as well.

I think this narration makes a lot of assumptions.

That wolf was never domesticated. Domestication is a genetic adaptation that involves retaining juvenile traits that allow an animal to overcome the boundary that would instinctively cause them to flee or fight. This would take many generations. You can imagine how that adaptation would be advantageous to animals that benefit from living at the edges of human settlement.

There's no way to know why that wolf interacted the way it did but it was wild and posed a potential risk due to it's instinctive programming.

Happy that it remained an uplifting story. But it's not responsible to spread the narrative that you can domesticate a wild animal.

People need to adapt to the constant change of Climate evolution. Sounds like they need to move.

Good thing Trump let this false Fear monger go.