Non-Photorealistic Rendering

With the improvements in technology that we have now, photo-realistic rendering is very popular choice when it comes to digital art. In some case you can't even tell what is physical or what is CG. It can also help when things need to be more believable, like characters or things that would not normally exist.

Just because we can doesn't mean that we should, though; some of the best and most famous work is famous because of it's stylisation, and that is what makes it unique - look at Roy Lichtenstein, or Disney designs. The more photorealistic it looks, the more it could look like someone elses' work - of course concept and composition is important, and artists think about these in different ways, but photorealism can really take away some of the style that makes an artist unique.

The more stylised something is, the less you are limited - exaggerated expressions, actions and features can add a sense of life to something that, ironically, photorealism can't. I feel like it can also reach a larger audience too; children especially are drawn to brighter, more simple designs, the sort of stuff that can sell a lot of merchandise. Things looks much more ordinary with photorealism, and are less likely to be memorable enough, visually at least, to be capable of selling as much. That isn't to say that it isn't a good thing because that can reduce the risk of gimmicky designs or ideas just for the sake of selling,but it depends on how much the artist really wants to make money off of what they are making.



Is this paper, is is this CG?

The answer is CG. Danish VFX artist Pingo Van Der Brinkloev made a set of paper like 3D models using Cinema 4D, and made a series of looping animations for them. The animation looks like it really should be a stop-motion, folded paper animation and I really wouldn't have thought it was CG. Using CG will have cut down the time and cost of making an animation like this by so much, that in this case, imitating life rather than stylising it so much works out, and is probably the best way to approach this.

While I still much prefer stylised works, I can see and accept that sometimes photorealism is the way to go.