No Flow in CGI: Difference between revisions
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To circumvent these limitations, authors and graphic artists got creative and made a few concessions and stylistic choices. Here's a small list:
* Girls and women would have short hair and wear skintight gear. When they did have long hair, it would be done up in buns or heavily "moussed", becoming an immobile block.
* Films or TV episodes or entire ''series'' would take place in settings whose inhabitants naturally lacked loose garments and billowing hair. For example, being [[Toy Story (franchise)|plastic toys]], [[
* All loose fabrics will be inert, either by being drawn taut or by never having a breeze/character move them.
Averting this trope is something of a Holy Grail for CGI animators, which can lead to being averted ''too'' hard. A lot of instances of flowing hair or gowns end up flowing ''too much'', taking attention from anything else in the scene, like Dr. Ross' hair in ''[[Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within|Final Fantasy the Spirits Within]]'', or Nariko's in ''[[Heavenly Sword]]''. When flowing is done right, it either is unambiguously the centerpiece of the scene, '''or''' doesn't call attention to itself but rather [[Willing Suspension of Disbelief|reinforces a viewer's immersion]]. This trope is why [[A Space Marine Is You]] is still so extremely prevalent: It's easier to model and animate a bald guy (or better yet, [[
Although to be fair, in real life a lot of people's hair barely moves. In CGI, a "good" movie has the characters medium-length hair moving as if it's submersed in water. In real life, it would barely move at all, even long hair comes nowhere near close to it, becoming a case of [[Reality Is Unrealistic]]. For an approach to averting this trope, see [[Jiggle Physics]].
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== Films -- Animation ==
* Also true to a limited extent in traditional animation. This is why Belle's hair was usually in a ponytail in ''[[Beauty and the Beast]]'' (though her dress twirls during the ballroom scene), and why flexible objects with elaborate surface patterns (like the flying carpet in ''[[Aladdin (Disney film)|Aladdin]]'') were generally avoided before CGI.
** In the direct-to-video sequels and the TV series, the carpet's elaborate design was downgraded so it could be drawn without CGI. Compare the [http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_YtQFcCXNo6k/TAANptMk7fI/AAAAAAAAFMw/NeOwtWQC06Y/s1600/carpet11.jpg carpet as seen in the feature] with the [http://i114.photobucket.com/albums/n278/amadou_82/Disney%20related%20pics/King%20of%20Thieves/da3039.jpg direct-to-video/television version]{{Dead link}}. This is why Carpet is considered a walking, flying [[Visual Effects of Awesome]] in the first movie, because it's done ''flawlessly''.
** Averted hard with ''[[The Little Mermaid]]'' in which Ariel has not only butt-length hair, but it's constantly moving ... underwater! Just watch [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pPUmv3U2XY this video] and marvel.
* In 2001's ''[[Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within|Final Fantasy the Spirits Within]]'', 40% of the CGI effects were to make Aki's hair flow (and she definitely had a tendency to shake it around to [[Shoot the Money|let you know]]). Just about every other character has short hair at most.
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** In the director's commentary on the DVD, they say that a relatively understated scene early in the movie caused lots of headaches. Mr. Incredible is examining his old costume and notices a rip from his fight with the robot (which prompts him to get a new costume, and it's that same rip that tips off his wife that he's being a superhero again, and...) Apparently, it is very, very hard to use CGI to animate someone sticking a hand through a hole in cloth.
** Another simple scene was processor-intensive: when the costume is chucked in the garbage can at Edna's and slowly slides in from the edge; it was incredibly difficult to simulate.
* One of the reasons [[Pixar]] stuck to making movies about plastic toys and bugs in the early days was because it avoided problems like this. Observe the difference in how dogs are modelled in ''[[Toy Story (franchise)|Toy Story]]'' (static, plastic-looking) compared to ''[[Toy Story 2]]'' (appropriately fuzzy). And even the characters that were ''supposed'' to look like plastic in the first ''[[Toy Story (franchise)|Toy Story]]'' film had noticeably limited facial animation compared to the next two films.
* By the time they produced ''[[Monsters, Inc.]]'' they'd developed software models that could make Sully's fur look fluffy, stiff, or windswept where necessary. But that bit of toilet paper stuck to a foot took the longest time to get right.
* Most human females that appear in Pixar films normally wear either pants or tight clothing. An exception to this rule would be a female patient in the dentist's waiting room near the end of ''[[Finding Nemo]]'', who is apparantly mistaken by both Nemo and the Tank Gang for Darla, especially in the fullscreen version where the exposed portion of said patient's legs are completely visible in all three of her appearances.
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* ''Barbie as Rapunzel'''s braid looks okay, but when she wears her hair "loose" it looks like it's made of rubber. Semi-justifiable because it took [[Disney]] [[Development Hell|years and years]] to perfect the technology for their [[Tangled|telling of the story]].
* ''[[Cars]]'' mostly exemplifies this trope; but there are some shots of flowing water, and the tearaways near the beginning of the movie produce various realistic flames which are especially impressive to anyone who knows how difficult realistic particle animation is.
* ''[[Tangled]]'' [https://web.archive.org/web/20131211145632/http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=fit-for-a-princess did well enough at avoiding this to attract scientific attention], although the models involved are still being improved.
** Averting this trope is the reason why this movie is the second most expensive film ever made. They did very well with the hair, clothes, and water... but the fire not so much.
* In the commentary for ''[[Over the Hedge (animation)|Over the Hedge]]'', they mention that the animators complained that there was a lot of hugging in the movie. Not because it was sappy, but because it was really hard to animate the fur in a hug.
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* A particularly glaring example would be Ezio's cape from ''[[Assassin's Creed II]]'' and ''[[Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood|Assassin's Creed Brotherhood]]''. When Ezio walking around or even jogging, his cape has a pretty realistic flow, but when he's running or on horseback, the cape becomes stiff as a damned board.
* Even though there is little flow, there are ways to fake it, at least in the [[PlayStation]]/[[Nintendo 64]]/[[Sega Saturn]] era. If something was supposed to flow, like a dress, the designers would at least have it warp a little to show some animation, like Zelda's dresses in ''[[Ocarina of Time]]''.
* In ''[[Dungeons
* ''[[
* Very common with mods for ''[[The Sims 2]]''. Though creators of mods have improved tremendously since the old days, it's not uncommon for it to appear that the sims are using industrial strength hairspray and way too much starch in their laundry. Also, a lot of custom content creators try to fix this and end up with the hair having a gap under the neck, skirts with black areas under them, and even feet bending at the ankle(usually with high heels that are higher than what is usual in the game).
* According to developers, some of the character design changes in ''[[Castlevania]] [[Castlevania Judgment|Judgment]]'' were made due to this trope. One often-cited example is Shanoa's short hair and church hood, which was much less well received than her long flowing hair from ''[[Order of Ecclesia]]''.
* In the original ''[[Castlevania: Rondo of Blood]]'' (which has sprite-based graphics), Maria Renard wears a dress and her hair down. In the 2.5D [[Video Game Remake|remake]] in ''Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles'', her Ayami Kojima redesign features pants and a ponytail, presumably because of this trope.
** And in the original ''Rondo'', Richter is wearing a long trenchcoat with a flowing bandanna, and his appearance in ''Symphony of the Night'' shows him with back-length hair and an even longer coat. In ''DXC'' he looks like a reject for Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band as a result of this cost-cutting.
* The reason we never get a 3D Alucard based on Ayami Kojima's design is because it would be really, ''really'' hard to make a 3D animation as magnificent as his ''[[Castlevania: Symphony of the Night]]'' sprite. His running animation started with about 15 frames, as he lunged into his run. Then looped another 15 for the running itself, complete with his long hair flowing and his cape flapping.
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** ''[[Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty]]'' also averts this with Raiden's hair, though it doen't seem to have much weight so it looks a bit unrealistic.
** In ''[[Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater]]'' Snake's clothes react convincingly well to wind etc.
* ''MLB: The Show 07'' on the [[
* ''[[Super Mario Bros. (video game)|Super Mario Bros]]''
** In ''[[New Super Mario Bros. Wii]]'', a second Toad (officially known as "Blue Toad") was used as the fourth playable character instead of Princess Peach in order to avoid programming the physics for her dress, as well as to have every character play the same way.
** The Mario series' relationship with this trope pre-dates three-dimensional graphics: Mario's trademark cap was added because the developers didn't want to have to animate hair. The mustaches were also a result of not wanting to animate a face.
*** Animate nothing. The mustaches were so you could ''tell there was a face to begin with''.
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* The ''[[Doctor Who]]'' webcast ''Dreamland'' falls squarely into this trope.
* Played with in ''The Legend of Zelda: The Light Of Courage''. Link and Zelda's hair and clothes are completely stiff, but Ganon's robe flows ''way too much'', at one point even ''falling halfway off'' when he moves too fast. (This was actually a mistake, but they decided to [[Throw It In]] because it was [[Rule of Funny|funny]].)
* ''[[RWBY]]'' usually averts this trope, but sometimes its [[Off-Model]] moments can include failures to flow cloth and hair. After the change in animation engines between volumes 3 and 4, the Off-Model moments all but vanished, and both clothing and hair were handled far better.
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* ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'': Not CGI, but Katara's "hair loopies" were opted for over long hair because they were easier to animate.
* One of the trope's first widespread sights was in ''[[The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest]]''. Whenever the characters entered the virtual Questworld, they would wear form-fitting armor instead of clothes, and due to the animation techniques, hair would look like a sculpted helmet, flow be damned.
* Various shows by [[Mainframe Entertainment]] had to use this trope. ''[[
* ''[[Shadow Raiders]]'' is set in space, with aliens made of rock, magma, who are insects, reptiles or robots. So no-one even ''has'' hair, nor wear billowy clothes. Only the reptiles of Bone have moving membranes/ridges on their backs, which do move along with them. A few rare scenes features static fabrics in the throne room of planet Fire.
* ''[[Beast Wars]]'' loves this trope. The big advantage to having a show with a cast composed of robots is that you do away with the issue of clothes and hair right from the get go. Of course the character models look like they're just composed of geometric shapes; they're all robots! Problems arise when you look at the animal alt-modes and the real-life animals they run across, fur and feathers might as well be sculpted on for all they move.
* ''[[Veggie Tales]]'' characters were designed as vegetables because they were basically spheres with a few extra features. Easy to animate. At least that's how it began. While the later character designs are largely the same, the subtle details have changed quite a bit. Larry now looks more like an actual cucumber, with bumps and color striations. The animation has gotten more sophisticated, but why would the animators ''want'' to do something more complex when what we have now works so well? Giving Bob and Larry hands at this point would make about as much sense as putting a drop-tile ceiling on the Sistine Chapel.
* In the ''[[Star Wars: The Clone Wars|Star Wars the Clone Wars]]'' CG theatrical film and animated series, the Jedi all wear gauntlets so the animators don't have to animate the flowing sleeves seen in the live-action movies. The Jedi robes also have no sleeves and are basically hooded cloaks. Finally, their hair looks like chiseled rock. Especially visible on Obi-Wan, whose rock beard has such a sharp edge to it he might be able [
* Usually played straight in ''[[Code Lyoko]]'', especially in season 1. And a rare justified case, because they are actually in a virtual space, so the CGI, with or without flow, is what the characters ''actually'' see. The Lyoko Avatars have all blocky hair (including Yumi's, who are in a tight bun) and clingy clothes. By season 2, the animators try adding a little flow, like with the occasional [[Dramatic Wind]], or Ulrich's hair ribbon flapping behind him when he's riding the [[Cool Bike|Overbike]]. By season 4, Yumi have loose hair that certainly flow with her [[She Fu|various acrobatics]], though the clothes are even more [[Sensual Spandex|skintight]].
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[[Category:Animation Tropes]]
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