Now here's a curious thing - and I'm amazed that there hasn't been more of a hoohaa kicked up about it. On the face of it this was a bold and interesting move. Motion capture your real life singer, and plunge the animated version of her into an amazing cartoon landscape. Occasionally tease the audience, letting them think you've gone back to the studio, then make things get even more unhinged on screen. Then at the end, reveal the real human singer in the same outfit, just to connect it to real life.
Great in theory, but give it a little extra thought and a whole hatful of potential problems begin to rack up. The first, and most simple one being - who are they going to do this in a more live situation in the Eesti Laul final. It's a slightly open secret that they record all the semi-final songs a couple of weeks in advance, with only the voting bits being shown live. But in a big live show in front of a hefty audience? Well that could prove a lot more tricky. And then there is the problem of the mo-cap itself. Those that attended the Semis in Estonia report that this was all done well in advance, and for the most part Kristel just paced about on stage, singing live, but waiting for her visual cue.
So it was the mostly-animated, prerecorded visual performance that the home voters were spending their pennies on, albeit with live vocals. How is that going to work if they're lucky enough to get to Stockholm? Will the EBU stand for it? Or will it usher in lots of acts suddenly singing along to cartoons on a big screen. It's the beginning of the end, I tells you! Even if it did look pretty cool.
This one's going to run and run, one suspects...
I always knew Aeris didn't die during Final Fantasy VII and that someday she'd return to represent a minor Baltic state in a singing contest.
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