It does have a big budget, but big budget <> Waste Money for small sequences that can be done at the level of fidelity needed with practical makeup effects. A good Producer puts the money where it's really needed.
CGI'd Data looks like Lores head from Datalore
- Thread starter WildManWizard
- Start date
Picard has a big budget for TV but that doesn't quite compare to a Marvel movie budget. Plus, Picard is roughly 10 hours vs. a Marvel movie's 2 (although of course we don't know how much screen time Mr. Data has)
Data's Rubber Mask?
Title says (most of) it all -
Does anyone know what the rationale was behind having Brent Spiner wear what appears to be, a a minimum, a really bad wig and unfortunate facial prosthetics, or possibly even a full-head mask, to reprise the role of Data?
In this modern age of digital de-aging, holographic Tupacs, and Star Trek Discovery-level CG on television, it is really surprising to me that they couldn't have helped out Data (and Riker) with some pixel-level retouch. Pictures attached for reference. I'm sorry in advance for the facial expressions. I was trying to capture multiple angles and positions of the prosthetics and the trailer doesn't exactly give us many frames to work with.
Title says (most of) it all -
Does anyone know what the rationale was behind having Brent Spiner wear what appears to be, a a minimum, a really bad wig and unfortunate facial prosthetics, or possibly even a full-head mask, to reprise the role of Data?
In this modern age of digital de-aging, holographic Tupacs, and Star Trek Discovery-level CG on television, it is really surprising to me that they couldn't have helped out Data (and Riker) with some pixel-level retouch. Pictures attached for reference. I'm sorry in advance for the facial expressions. I was trying to capture multiple angles and positions of the prosthetics and the trailer doesn't exactly give us many frames to work with.
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S
Spicy Thunder
Guest
I would most certainly watch that
The CG in the trailers (the second one especially) is early and rough, full of placeholders like Discovery-era shuttles. While I think Data will not look great in the final product (remember, Picard's budget may be high for a 10 part series, but it pales compared to a Marvel movie), it will be better than what we've seen so far.
Merged this with an existing thread on the topic and added the thread title to the post, as it was referenced.Data's Rubber Mask?
Title says (most of) it all -
Does anyone know what the rationale was behind having Brent Spiner wear what appears to be, a a minimum, a really bad wig and unfortunate facial prosthetics, or possibly even a full-head mask, to reprise the role of Data?
In this modern age of digital de-aging, holographic Tupacs, and Star Trek Discovery-level CG on television, it is really surprising to me that they couldn't have helped out Data (and Riker) with some pixel-level retouch. Pictures attached for reference. I'm sorry in advance for the facial expressions. I was trying to capture multiple angles and positions of the prosthetics and the trailer doesn't exactly give us many frames to work with.
It’s not a mask.Data's Rubber Mask?
Title says (most of) it all -
Does anyone know what the rationale was behind having Brent Spiner wear what appears to be, a a minimum, a really bad wig and unfortunate facial prosthetics, or possibly even a full-head mask, to reprise the role of Data?
In this modern age of digital de-aging, holographic Tupacs, and Star Trek Discovery-level CG on television, it is really surprising to me that they couldn't have helped out Data (and Riker) with some pixel-level retouch. Pictures attached for reference. I'm sorry in advance for the facial expressions. I was trying to capture multiple angles and positions of the prosthetics and the trailer doesn't exactly give us many frames to work with.
And the wig looks fine in the full profile shot that you didn’t include. Something to do with the CG is the head on shots screws it up
Sure looks like one to me. If it were CGI, it would probably be more convincing.
I don’t think they have the budget to make a convincing CG de-age. That’s why it looks bad.
And we know they digitally manipulated the shot, you can see it in his hairline
And that's why I think they went with prosthetics instead. Just because something looks unconvincing doesn't prove it's CGI. Prosthetics have decades more history of being unconvincing than CGI does.
Digital retouching is routine in any number of contexts. That doesn't prove they didn't use prosthetics as well. For instance, they could've retouched his hairline to disguise a seam in the makeup. Prosthetic appliances like masks and bald caps have never worked well with foreheads; that's where you're most likely to see the seam or wrinkles in the latex as the actor's brow muscles move underneath. So they could've used a mask and then digitally erased the evidence of the seams or wrinkles afterward, like how Avengers: Endgame put Chris Hemsworth in a full-body prosthetic for his out-of-shape appearance and digitally erased the seam on the back and the occasional wrinkles that showed up as he moved.
Anyway, we're both just guessing based on what we see. The only thing that would really answer the question is actual comments from the show's producers or actors about how they did it, and I can't find anything to that effect online. The closest thing I can find is this statement from Spiner:
https://trekmovie.com/2019/08/01/st...-clue-about-datas-return-in-star-trek-picard/
That sounds to me like it's saying he was in makeup for Picard, although it's ambiguous, since he was talking earlier about the time it took to get into the makeup back in TNG. And it could be that they applied a basic Data makeup to his aged face and then digitally erased the wrinkles. But I have a hard time believing that would look so much like they stuck prosthetics to his aged face to cover the wrinkles. That's the only explanation I can think of for how puffy and rubbery his face looks. If it were digital, I'd think they could tweak the shape of his face to look more like it did in the past.
Even IF they use CGI to de-age 'Data' in a shot, they're still going to have him wear the pancake face makeup and contact lenses. That said, I don't think they'd bother given the expense and POST time required over just doing the 'Data' makeup and either practical prosthetics or some digital frame manipulation VS full CGI based de-aging.
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This thread makes me really curious to see at least a snippet of the raw Spiner footage. Hopefully there’ll be a bonus feature on it a couple years from now when the Blu-ray is released
On Trekcore twitters page they've been tweeting about Brent Spiner's panel this morning he says they were in a hurry to get the trailer out and Data's Cgi look wasn't finished yet. Brent mentions that when Picard airs in January, He said his hair will be fixed and that Data will be looking like he did in Nemesis.
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to quote professor farnsworth from futurama "Good news everyone!".
