Technology

Perhaps no one knows more about the role of online media than Levi. 

In the 1990s, when people in Hollywood were still paying attention to print and TV media, Levi had already asked Bruce to intervene in film and television review sites on the Internet.

Bruce is not someone who can do many practical things. 

When Levi asked him to do these online reviews, even though he obviously has the identity of a film critic, he did not do well.

Fortunately, these websites were not very valuable in the initial stage. After Levi invested money, Bruce still occupied some rights in the website.

For Levi, this was enough.

Unlike Theron's strong interest in these things, Levi thinks online comments don't matter.

First of all, the scoring mechanism itself is not rigorous - as far as Levi remembers, in IMDb, as long as it is a superhero movie, it can always get a good high score - this is determined by popularity. 

Some types of films are particularly popular among certain people, so the scores are very high. Because of language and cultural differences, the ratings of some movies are not objective.

The most typical examples are Infernal Affairs and The Departed. Most people agree that the Hong Kong version is better when commenting. However, because English is more popular and more people have watched the American version, the rating of the American version is higher than that of the Hong Kong version. 

Is this because the movie is better? No, this is because of the language problem.

This site, by itself, lacks rigor. The possibility of good movies getting a low score under this scoring system is very low, but a bad film is very likely to get a high score because of the problem with the scoring system.

In fact, from its inception, this kind of stuff has never been able to impact the world of mainstream filmmakers.

It's just that this thing is indeed an excellent platform to communicate with movie fans. This is especially true for movie fans from other countries. 

Movie fans in other countries do not have access to foreign media and cannot see news. Most of them can only understand the image of movie stars through the Internet. The image on the Internet is likely an important basis for determining a person's image.

In Levi's previous life, he had seen a lot of negative news about many actors in the media, but movie fans still regarded them as idols in other countries. 

Regarding the power of the Internet, he is very clear.

After all, this is an excellent media promotion channel. For the film industry, mastering the media means mastering the right to speak. 

Levi doesn't need to hold all the right to speak in his own hands, but he doesn't want others to scold him and the people around him.

"I think I have to think about how to pay more attention to online publicity in the future. My publicity company told me about this. I didn't listen carefully. I will have to pay attention in the future." While browsing the website, Theron turned her head and spoke to Levi. 

Levi responded to her excitement with a smile. "Technology has improved... With the advancement of technology, the distance between celebrities and the audience has become smaller and smaller. But don't be too happy; people can have more and more access to the lives of celebrities. 

  There will be more exposure of the celebrities to the audience. There will be more and more street photos, and even more sexy photos will appear. I am afraid the days of flawless women on camera are over." 

In fact, the Internet is not necessarily a good thing for celebrities. At least, in Levi's memory, there are many people who are not very grateful to the Internet... 

In the past era, no matter how many unsavory rumors Hepburn and Monroe had in private, they were still all perfect in the eyes of the outside world. 

But in the future era, this will not be possible.

Levi's sigh made Theron glance at him, "It seems that you don't like high technology very much." 

"Who said that? On the contrary, I like these technologies very much - If I am not a star, no one will pay attention to my life, and what high technology will give me will only be better movies." Levi smiled, "Technology will bring trouble to people, but this kind of trouble is definitely worth it." 

When he said this, Levi's thoughts drifted away: what he thought of was another thing he did when he came to Japan this time.

***

What Levi thought was that one of the important reasons for him to stay in Asia was that in addition to movies, he also wanted to urge his own special effects company to establish a base in Asia.

South Korea has been vigorously developing the film industry in the past two years, and it was a good time to move the special effects company over in time.

In fact, before coming this time, Levi had already transferred most of the special effects team. After coming to Asia this time, he also took the time to go to Korea to see his team.

The person in charge here is Liu Lulu, who was working at Disney back then. In his opinion, it would be better to find an Asian to work in Asia.

Hollywood's behind-the-scenes staff has a lot of mobility. Under Levi's hiring, Liu Lulu also agreed to come here to take charge of his special effects team. 

Now that the team has made basic preparations, what they want to do is the next step. Levi's visit this time is also to assign specific tasks.

"I hope you can take more photos to simulate the environment in the real universe. In this regard, make the greatest efforts..."

Levi's request for his team is to simulate the space environment. The reason for doing this is because Levi is very clear that 3D movies are also an important direction for future development.

3D technology actually existed in the 1990s, but the cost was too high, and the technology was immature. It really became popular only after Avatar.

Moreover, even after Avatar, Levi believes this technology is not very mature. 

In Levi's memory, even after Avatar, a large number of movies began to be changed to 3D versions, and countless 3D movies were produced, but most of them were evaluated in two words by the audience: money fraud.

Is it because these movies are all poorly made? Levi doesn't think so. 

If one or two films are not good, it is the director's problem. If a large number of films are all bad, it is a technical problem.

In Levi's opinion, this is because movies under 3D technology have severe distortion. This kind of technology is very good for cartoons but not so good if it can be used for live-action movies. 

Avatar can be said to be a good opportunistic trick: it chose to shoot aliens as the main body, and the alien environment is also completely virtual. The alien skin and physical requirements are not as high as in other movies. It is shot in such an environment, covering up a lot of technical deficiencies in 3D making the film look good.

And other movies don't have this convenience. If the technology is not mature enough, it will only fail no matter how you shoot it.

Levi didn't want others to say he was cheating on money and didn't want to shoot some seriously distorted things. These things are irresponsible for the film itself. 

However, he didn't want to make a cartoon-style movie. 

There is one other excellent movie using 3D technology in his memory. In Levi's memory, the 3D effects of the movie Gravity are pretty good. Therefore, Levi also hopes to simulate more of the cosmic environment in order to be able to shoot such a movie.

As for his request, Liu Lulu immediately asked, "Do you want to shoot a movie with a cosmic background? A science fiction movie?"

Levi nodded. 

"We can find some astrophysicists to join the team to simulate the effect you mentioned. However, you have to tell me, which direction of research do you value most?" 

Liu Lulu's question made Levi frown. After thinking for a while, he spoke. "I don't know the technical terms, so I just say how I want to make the movie. Well... maybe it's set in the universe. It probably talks about the relationship between humans and aliens. The environment in which aliens live is very... difficult; it's a planet between the two stars of Centaurus..." Levi thought about The Three-Body Problem novel in his memory and expressed his thoughts. 

Since he is planning to let Liu Cixin write the script, this story should be the most likely.

However, before he finished speaking, Liu Lulu interrupted him.

"Centaurus? This is impossible."

"Why?"

"The distance between the two stars in Centaurus is 11.2 AU. 

[E/N: One AU is the distance from the Sun to Earth's orbit, which is about 93 million miles (150 million km).]

  The environment of that planet is entirely different from that of the Earth. The illumination intensity is about one-thirtieth of the Earth, equivalent to Jupiter. 

  Why would the aliens there want to come to live on Earth instead of going to Jupiter? 

  Even if your hypothesis is true and there are three planets, the chaos of the three planets will inevitably result in one planet being pushed away. The planets in between cannot survive for a long time - the two stars in the Nanmen II system are so chaotic that none of the surrounding planets can last for millions of years, and the three-body motion itself has no possibility of success..." 

To Liu Lulu's question, Levi was stunned. He really didn't expect that there would be such significant loopholes in this theory.

"Have you studied astrophysics?" Levi asked.

"No, but it's common sense." Liu Lulu raised her eyebrows, saying, "I knew it in elementary school." 

"Elementary school?"

"Yeah, you didn't watch cartoons in elementary school? Cybertron setting is one of the planets in the Alpha Centauri constellation... When you were watching Transformers as a child, why didn't you read the knowledge about star orbits in the background setting?"

Only someone like you would read it! 

When you watch the Transformers cartoon, instead of looking at the transformation, if you pay attention to Cybertron, your focus is completely wrong! 

And a little girl, what kind of Transformers are you looking at!

Levi initially thought the Three-Body Problem could be considered hard science fiction. However, Liu Lulu retorted at this moment, making him feel like he had been poured cold water on him.

However, the complaints in his heart were all complaints, but Levi also felt a little happy about it: it might be good to find the problem early so that he can make the movie better.

*****

Thanks and kudos for my patreons 

Scott DePaepe

MMMCMXCIX, or 3,999

Britanna

Mandy G

The Main Man

Marcelo Maia

Danny York

DragonEz

You can read advanced chapters on my Patreon account: https://www.patreon.com/Sayonara816.