What is a Practical Effect?

In movies and television, a practical effect is a visual effect produced without computer-generated imagery. Practical effects are created using physical elements (miniatures, paintings) and techniques such as camera tricks.

Why call your blog Practical Effects?

As many movie fans will attest, practical effects look more “real” than computer generated effects. Computer effects are easier and cheaper to create, but there is often a trade off in quality.

The same thing can be true about many things in life.

What Practical Effects was supposed to be…

The Practical Effects blog was meant to be a forum to discuss the use of technology in ways that would (hopefully) make our world a better place. It was meant to ask questions like, “Can big data be used to fight climate change?,” or, “Is artificial intelligence really that scary?” Practical Effects would tackle these issues and more.

I set up the blog...and that was it. For a couple of years, I struggled to motivate myself to write anything like a critical analysis of a technology topic. It turns out that I’m just not that guy.

So I decided to open the scope a little. I now talk about anything and everything that interests me, and it hopefully lead to some good observations.

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