r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/padfoony • 3h ago

Christopher Nolan avoided CGI and used 7ft stuntmen to portray Laestrygonians in The Odyssey. The giant leader, King Antiphates, is portrayed by actor Josh Stewart, while Matt Damon’s stunt double is Devyn Dalton, who is just under 5ft.

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u/siraolo 3h ago

Forced perspective really does a lot here. 

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u/tayl0559 2h ago

that's not how forced perspective works. you can't use forced perspective to make something close to the camera look smaller than something far from the camera. it only works the other way around. if anything, the perspective is acting against the intended illusion here

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u/Ok-Gur-349 2h ago

Isn't this more of a focal length thing. Like the tilt shift zoom effect.

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u/tayl0559 2h ago edited 2h ago

yes, it's using a narrower focal length to make the farther away subject appear larger than they otherwise would due to foreshortening

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u/Deaffin 2h ago

So what you're saying is they use the focal thingy to force your perspective into shifting?

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u/Zauberer-IMDB 2h ago

Forced perspective has a more specific meaning as an in-camera effect. The forced perspective shot requires scaled objects to change perception of size. In this case, the people are actually a larger and smaller person, it's just the lens doing the work to make a real difference in size seem bigger. A classic forced perspective shot is like the cart scene in Lord of the Rings where Frodo's half of the cart was literally larger than Gandalf's.

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u/Lou_C_Fer 1h ago

Someone tried to get semantic on you over a technical term. It's the second time I've seen it today. It drives me nuts. Words have meaning, but it seems that a segment of us have decided that words mean whatever they want them to mean. Ugh.

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u/Whyskgurs 1h ago

Like in the Fast ant Furious movie with Dwayne and Vin in a scene together, it's meant to have em look similar in size while squaring up to each other.

But the actual size difference results in Dwayne standing back and off to the side by like, 6 feet, and it's quite noticeable how much they tried and failed to stretch it in that scene.

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u/PhilxBefore 1h ago

Don't you dare force your perspectives on me, NERD!

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u/sikyon 1h ago

The lens does not do the work - focal length lenses and forced perspective are actually the same physics.

The relative size of 2 objects on the camera sensor (without distortion) are entirely controlled by how far the camera sensor is from the 2 objects.

Focal length lenses and forced perspective are 2 parts of the same coin because if you want to make A look bigger than B, you simply get closer to B for the shot.

With the wrong lens, however, object B can be larger than the camera sensor and therefore out of the framing. Or the 2 objects can be very small in your frame, and need to be cropped (and therefore lose resolution).

What changing the focal length on your lens does is simply allow the camera to be closer or father away from your subjects, while still allowing your subjects to fill the sensor of your camera the way you want.

In forced perspective shots the focal length of the lens (or the sensor size) must be adjusted so that the subjects are maintained in frame, when comparing to the focal length of a lens used from farther away.

TL;DR not exactly the same thing but very heavily related and incorrect to say that focal length changes relative size of objects

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u/SeveralArcaneRats 1h ago

Narrow isn’t the normal term referring to focal length just FYI. It’d be Long Focal Length/telephoto (which has a narrow viewing angle).

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u/implode573 1h ago

If we want to get really perspective the compression achieved from the long focal length is moreso caused by the distance from the subjects. The long focal length just makes the frame smaller. The farther you are from the subjects, the closer they are together relative to you, which means they will appear closer to their actual relative sizes. So you can use this trick to make objects in the background appear larger than it would if you were closer, such as this actor or the mountains or the moon. But the limitation is that it just makes those two subjects more accurately proportioned; it's as if you're moving the two subjects to where they are standing next to each other. And that means with that alone, you can't make the further subject appear relatively larger than it already is, only closer to the actual relative size.

But combined with other techniques used, such as forced perspective, framing, and a little use of cgi, you could make it appear as if the further subject is actually even further than it is, which would trick your brain into thinking it's a bit larger than it is. This second paragraph is my best guess anyway.

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u/FullHouse222 1h ago

Also the low angle shot. The way this shot shoots up at the giant makes him look a lot more imposing. They do this a lot with villain shots paired with the lighting going top down so that it creates the shadow effect that makes them look much more dramatic.

https://www.studiobinder.com/camera-shots/camera-angles/low-angle-shot/

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u/Themountaintoadsage 2h ago

It’s a bit of both

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u/Acrobatic_Wrap_9971 48m ago

I think it's more about CBT