T3 spent over $250 mil

OMFG that is limitless beyond limitless

do these budgets include advertising?

nope :)

they had to halt in between filming to raise more money

Some movies can pull it off, some can't. The point of CG characters and monsters and shit is to make it look real. 90% of the things that are CG in movies look fake as hell. That's why I say not many can pull off some good CG stuff.

T3 is the most expensive movie made to this date, pretty insane amount of money to spend on a movie if you ask me.

on cg
 

to be completely honest. i cant remember seeing a cg monster that i couldnt tell was cg. as a matter of fact ive never seen anything come out of a computer that could be descibed as "from my darkest nightmares". the closest in realism that comes to mind was gollum, and even he had his moments.

my issue with cg is that it completly kills the makeup industry. answer me this- what looked better, the wolf in American Werewolf in London, or the Cg wolves in American Werewolf in Paris. The zombie effects in day of the dead, or the zombie effects in resident evil?. And granted it does take talent to design and render cg charactors, but i personally believe that there is far much more skill in the application and design of practical effects. there is somthing very special about drawing somthing on paper and watching it come to life in front of you in actual reality.

I mean really movies like matrix II/III and blade II. those fight scenes looked like dick, because we all new it wasnt real. it looked like a fucking cartoon.

what i do appreciate is the melding of the two feilds. movies like LOTR, Last Samurai and others are doing a very good job or integrating both styles. personally i think that were beginning to reach the peak of computer graffics and that instead of seeing effects that are completely cg, well see effects that are a mixture of cg and practical. i expect for the two feilds to evolve togeather in sybiosis.

CGI as already stated is bad when it's over used. The best CGI stuff is the things you don't even realise is CGI and I'm killing myself here for not having a good example of it! But I've listened to a lot of DVD commentaries where they say something isn't real and you're like NO WAY!!! I think one of the best CGI stuff is where Legolas jumps up onto the horse in Two Towers - amazing. And yes I don't like CGI as it just looks fake and you know it's not real! If it's obviously not present you loose the suspense/scare. Worst CGI I remember was in Space Precinct (SP?) which looked like it was created on an old 48K Spectrum or something. I like in camera effects, they will always look more realistic, CGI has become an easy way out. The Matrix sequels had the worst CGI for such a big movie. I don't know, got nothing against it when it's done well and it doesn't help when you grow up without CGI. Is probably different for people a lot younger than myself who had Jurassic Park when they were young.

Yep...That's pretty much the answer, right there...

i can sum it all up in one single over used word....bah!