When the heavy weight throws a knockout is it no surprise, when the pip squeak does so it is stupendous..
I am not threatened by 3D, I was a 3D artist before I foudn miniature sculpting, and I am brushign the rust off the old bag o tricks now, BUT I LIKE sculptign more than I do modeling. Modeling has many advantages, btu I appreciate the end result of physical modelign FAR more.
I am stretching my neck across the block by saying this but, in my opinion DIgital modeling is not " art ". The IDEA of whatever is being modeled IS, but the process of 3D modeling is more a craft than an art.
I say this because it is exact and quantifiable. You can only move the vertices, edges, and faces in mathematically measured increments within the X,Y,Z axis, and can automatically un-do and re-do to your heart's content. It requires absolutely 0 hand / eye co-ordination, that helps a lot but the technology acts like a guard rail to help you in ways that CANNOT be replicated in the real world.
It requires no real manual skill in how the vertices, edges, and faces are manipulaited and moved. You can rotoscope ( I know there is a more correct term for it in 3D modeling ) a piece of 2D art into the modeling workspace and set the camera to a mode that sort of flattens the movements of the modeling to allow you to basically play " connect the dots " until you have a damn near perfect likeness.
Concetration helps but is not an absolute neccessity.
You can zoom almost infinitely which also scales your movements propotionally. Basically this would be like being able to enlarge the face of a mini to life size ( or larger really ) so as to paint the reflections of light on the eye ball.
I could go on and on and on but I won't. I think I have illustrated my point.
I am NOT sayign that there is no skill involved, there certainly is, and there are LOADS of bad CG models and very few really good ones that actually prove that point. There IS artistic quality and character in teh images produced by 3D modeling, but the process itself, I think, is craft.
Art is a very difficult process to quantify, but I think that people DO know the difference bewteen art and craft when they see it. Hence the idea that digital modeling is somehow " cheating ". Personally I do nto think it is cheating, it really is just another tool in the box, but I do judge images produced through CG VERY differently than I do those produced physically by hand. To further qualify the idea I will also say that I judge putty pushing VERY differently than I do Stone Carving, BUT I still consider both of these Arts.
And no the box in teh corner that spits out 3D prints will NOT happen anytime soon.
Why??? Ok consider this. DO you want to handel toxic resin dusts IN YOUR HOME? No, of course not. Woudl you eat or drink from a resin cup or bowl? No, of course not. Teh onyl other material used thus far is wax, which is probably not food safe, nor woudl it hold up to any amount of heat.
When Jurassic park was in production, the big idea in HollyWierd's big heads was that soon, they would no longer need to worry about unstable actors or PriMadonna's because CG woudl soon replace them all. There was actually an effort ( or the idea at least ) to make a new John Wayne movie using CG manipulated footage.
Guess what? It still has not happened and Jurassic Park was released how long ago??
