Will CGI make Pornstars redundant?

[muwarr90]

Originally Posted by reclaimer

We're at the point that hobbyists are producing stuff that is not far off from life like at the moment using programs like Source Filmmaker and Blender. High definition models and skins can be bought and sold so that the cost of production are split over many people.

That being said, you're right that an actual company producing stuff would almost certainly have to have professionals that are expensive. But said professional could produce hundreds of videos a year through various shortcuts that animation and video game companies already use. e.g. Let's say they make 5 different 20 second cowgirl animations on a model skeleton. With repeating frames, doing them at various speeds, blending them in different orders, doing them with different skins, showing them from different angles, they could make a near infinite number of different videos.

I honestly think that the cost of doing it in 3d CG is comparable to that of running a studio for the year and all of the costs associated with that. The reason nobody is doing it is that's a pretty big financial risk. If a porn studio goes under, they can at least recoup some of their costs by selling their film library to another studio. If a 3d CG porn company goes under, all of their assets are pretty much worthless.

Those shortcuts would be noticeable. Back in the 80s and 90s some studios would try to extend scenes by editing in the same portion of the video multiple times, sometime times even from a different angle. It usually stood out that you had already seen this and it was generally very annoying. People will not want to buy videos that show the same repetitive, canned motions, that they've already seen.

[alexora]

Originally Posted by muwarr90

It's not a matter of affording the equipment, it's knowing how to use the equipment, and having the time and talent to use it effectively.

Same goes for live action porn: so much of it is poorly shot, badly lit, and often with appalling sound quality.

For cgi, of course you need talented individuals designing and animating the product, and just as is the case with live action crews, if you pay peanuts you get monkeys.

In any case this thread asks "Will CGI make Pornstars redundant?", meaning that it isn't about what can be realistically achieved right now, but how things might play out in the future.

[reclaimer]

Originally Posted by muwarr90

Those shortcuts would be noticeable. Back in the 80s and 90s some studios would try to extend scenes by editing in the same portion of the video multiple times, sometime times even from a different angle. It usually stood out that you had already seen this and it was generally very annoying. People will not want to buy videos that show the same repetitive, canned motions, that they've already seen.

I get what you're saying, but comparing the studio magic of the 80s and 90s to what would be possible today or the future with CGI is somewhat foolish. There are so many small tweaks they could make to make it different enough that nobody would notice unless they're explicitly trying to. When something is literally the same in every respect, that's noticeable even if you're not paying too much attention.

[muwarr90]

Originally Posted by reclaimer

I get what you're saying, but comparing the studio magic of the 80s and 90s to what would be possible today or the future with CGI is somewhat foolish. There are so many small tweaks they could make to make it different enough that nobody would notice unless they're explicitly trying to. When something is literally the same in every respect, that's noticeable even if you're not paying too much attention.

And what I'm saying is that putting in all those small tweeks, and making each scene seem new and different takes a lot of skilled effort. It's not something that can or will be done quickly and easily.

Look at it this way...Even with nearly limitless resources it takes Pixar, or Marvel years to make a CGI or computer animation intensive film. (I won't go to the extreme of including James Cameron/Avatar). Churning out 100s of scenes a year, of even minimal quality, is still going to be a huge and very expensive task.

The real kicker is that the CGI intensive films we see justify that cost and effort by showing us things that simply cannot happen in physical reality. That's not the case with porn.

There will always remain the option of getting a couple of young people in front of a camera to do what comes naturally. Studios will get much more bang for their buck that way. (Pun completely intended).

[thruster315]

It's not going to happen any time soon as like so many people have pointed out, it's still expensive as hell. But given some time it might happen one day. All tech prices drop at some point. I'm thinking the profit margin on a porn flick is pretty slim and until someone can actually find a way to make it financially viable, it's not going to happen any time soon. I've never know the business to give out freebies or do things without a profit motive.

[KeepItReal]

Originally Posted by naturals

No.

Err... YES !!

http://imgbox.com/NFy72IKz

[thruster315]

Originally Posted by KeepItReal

Err... YES !!

I'll admit it. I'm impressed. She looks pretty damn good. But I also know the differences between making a short GIF and doing a decent film can be worlds apart. For a short cycle like that, it's kinda fun but I still think we're a ways off from making a feature film of any sorts.

One of my fears is that the first long format CGI porn flicks is going to look as lifeless as Polar Express. While technically impressive, we all knew the characters in that movie looked plastic. It was tough to relate to. And on a topic like sex & erotica that's so personal, I think we need to be able to connect to them a little more. It's akin to looking at a nice pencil drawing of a hot woman as opposed to seeing a photograph of a hot woman; we're just going to connect on a primal level with the photograph a little better.

So maybe one day someone will be able to make a longer CGI porn flick that is relatable but no time soon IMO.

[waltermanjiang]

The situation of "uncanny valley" is still some time off before its resolved.

In the meantime, before a time whereby visual Turing Tests are applied to every video for authenticity, let's celebrate the curves and aesthetics of our favourite porn stars!

[Johnny Cage]

I think it will happen through some combo of deepfakes and 3D created imagery.

So like they use basic 3D models to perform the sex acts, essentially creating the scene.

Then this is overlayed by more realistic looking models using a deepfake like process.

Then they do a third pass to make it all look even more real and tweak the small mistakes that the second step of the process might have made.

Admittedly you need someone with enough nous to do these three steps. But that's just one person! Most live porn shoots will be paying more than one person. And just the porn starlet might be paid like 1500 dollars for a day's work. There is almost no chance you'd be paying this tech guy that kind of rate. I mean, sure, there are tech guys out there earning 35K a month easily, but those are not the types who would end up making CGI porn anyway, so...

[Johnny Cage]

Also there is already a lot of machinima porn out there using game engines.

So what if the game engines become photorealistic or near photorealistic? We are not that far removed from that point imho?