lordjedi said:

I think that would depend on what someone is looking for. If I'm looking for a gleaming city with tall spires and rounded buildings, Coruscant is the epitome of that. If I'm looking for a gritty, metropolitan area, with a bunch of downtrodden people, then downtown LA is the perfect location for that. Sure, you could build Coruscant as a model, but I'm sure it would take much longer to do with very little reward.

It would not be a "little reward" to make Coruscant with physical models or to have an actual set for characters to walk within for the Jedi Temple (as apposed to a green screen). It may have cost more, sure, but the end result would have benefited more than a little.

I was blown away the other day watching Bladerunner on Blu-ray. The beautiful sets used in those movies with their brilliant use of lighting and texture were astonishingly superior to any of the cg environments we've been offered in movies lately. Even more mundane use of lighting will still have a depth and weight to it with real world objects (say in BttF's suburban environments or the "palace" of Queen Amidala in Phantom Menace). I have yet to see any cg replicate that weight or depth to the same degree.

However, your point about Kamino is well taken. It was a lot of fun to see that water world realized in a movie and that might have been my favorite set of scenes in AotC. I know a real ocean with violent storms would have been superior, but that would have obviously been out of the question. Though, I do wonder what kind of a superior visual could have been achieved with a composite of techniques (both real and cgi).

Essentially, as I said earlier in this thread, cgi is amazing in what it does best, but other effects, of similar or less expense, do a better job (particularly with cg enhancement) and movies shouldn't be limited to one technique or another. The best techniques for each part of a visual are what should always be used (within limits of time and money of course). Intentionally using cgi for everything because it's "high-tech" is a poor excuse and only speaks of an inferior vision on the part of a director.