# CG versus CGI - have we given up? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 4, 2005, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599 "2005-08-04T18:19:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/61 "2017-02-23T16:31:35Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > I think in many cases the redundancy does help, as we don’t parse initialisms and acronyms by their constituent parts. The objection that redundancy is not desirable or even incorrect in language is, in my opinion, misguided. I would argue that in most cases the redundancy aids in immediate comprehension. To me, “ISBN number” is more immediately understandable vs “ISBN.” If you write about BASIC code, you’re really writing about Beginner’s All-Purpose Instruction Code code, which is redundant. Except that I feel it’s silly to object to its redundancy–it’s a completely natural English construct. Nobody parses down BASIC into its individual components, but rather treats it as its own entity. Same with GOP party or HIV virus or VIN number or AC current, etc. Sure, I didn’t intend my post to be chiding people for redundantly wasting our time by saying “ATM Machine”. I was just pointing out that even in cases where the final word of the acronym is stuck immediately after the acronym, there are some cases where doing so clearly generates a phrase with a distinctly different meaning (“Laser Radiation” means something very different from “Laser”) and some where it doesn’t (“ATM Machine”). ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/62 "2017-02-23T16:49:26Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > What do you think [DDT](http://acronyms.thefreedictionary.com/DDT) means, for example? Jake “The Snake” Roberts’ finishing move, duh. Named after the insecticide. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2017, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/63 "2017-02-23T19:47:55Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Also, isn’t “computer graphics” redundant? What other kinds of graphics are there? So my kid was watching Paul McCartney on TV and turned around and asked, “Dad? What other three guys?” I just took a complex book to commercial print, POD and Kindle and used every major tool in Creative Suite (including some video and audio tools). Having created commercially-published book using an IBM Selectric to typeset body copy, typeset sheets from an optical graphics house, and technical pens for illustrations, all assembled on blueline board. I feel so old now. I’m going to totter off and die on an ice floe. There are still ice floes, right? ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/64 "2017-02-24T01:28:47Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > And yet, every graphic artist I know works on a computer. In fact, the main difference between an “artist” and a “graphic artist” is that the latter operate almost exclusively in a digital environment. > > It may have been different in the past, but in 2017, “graphics” means computers. In the pre-computer days there was a job called a “commercial artist”. This was the guy or gal who assembled advertising, did brochures, book illustrations, etc. This involved photo retouching with ink or airbrush, lettering, layout, and lots of other similar stuff. As well as creating original artwork with a camera, pen & ink, water color, acrylics, etc. It was very distinct from “artist” or “fine artist”, somebody who painted or sculpted or whatever to produce mostly decorative works for sale or by commission. IMO “grahics artist” is simply the “commercial artist” of old updated to modern tools. And, just as in the old days, there’s a lot of overlap in the tools & techniques used by the decorative or fine artists and those used by the commercial or graphics artists. > [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > … > I feel so old now. I’m going to totter off and die on an ice floe. There are still ice floes, right? Not for long. Better hurry. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 9:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/65 "2017-02-24T09:33:22Z")
OK, so maybe I’m wrong. Here’s a challenge - find me a reference from anywhere on the web from the past 10 years that uses the word “graphics” in some context other than computers, in contemporary practice. (My own experience, incidentally, is in low-grade advertising and localization. To me, “Graphic Artist” means “Person who works on a MacIntosh”.) ---
**Author:** ![ticker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@ticker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ticker)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/66 "2017-02-24T10:09:02Z")
Even if it were true that all contemporary graphic artists only ever use computers, that would not mean that all extant graphic art was produced on a computer. That would be like saying that since virtually all commercial photography is now digital, ‘digital photography’ is redundant and should just be called ‘photography’. Ansel Adams and Henri Cartier-Bresson be dammed. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/67 "2017-02-24T12:38:26Z")
> [@ticker](#): > > Even if it were true that all contemporary graphic artists only ever use computers, that would not mean that all extant graphic art was produced on a computer. That would be like saying that since virtually all commercial photography is now digital, ‘digital photography’ is redundant and should just be called ‘photography’. Ansel Adams and Henri Cartier-Bresson be dammed. I’d say that in today’s world, “digital photography” is indeed redundant, as is “flat-screen TV” and, in a few years, “mobile phone”. The archaic form of the technology doesn’t have to be extinct for a new term to be redundant - the new technology just has to be the default. Therefore, since computer graphics are the default form of graphics, the word “computer” is unnecessary. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/68 "2017-02-24T12:45:53Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > I’d say that in today’s world, “digital photography” is indeed redundant, as is “flat-screen TV” and, in a few years, “mobile phone”. The archaic form of the technology doesn’t have to be extinct for a new term to be redundant - the new technology just has to be the default. Therefore, since computer graphics are the default form of graphics, the word “computer” is unnecessary. Not really. As long as people are aware of the other technology it may be helpful in certain contexts to be clear. And being clear isn’t redundant. Secondly, “flat screen TV” isn’t redundant. It is obsolete. No one has made _flat screen_ TVs in some time. They do make\* flat panel\* TVs, however. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/69 "2017-02-24T17:08:49Z")
Terminology shifts take longer than **Alessan** thinks. In the Olden Dayes we had phones with dials. These were called “phones”. Then we had phones with dials or pushbuttons. So people used both the terms “pushbutton phone” and “dial phone”. Then, just as dials were finally dying off below 0.1% of all installed phones we got cellular/mobile phones. At which point “pushbutton phone” began slowly to morph into “landline phone.” Bottom line: When it’s been 30 years since the very last artist picked up a brush or ink pen or sculpting tool we can take the word “computer” off the word “graphics”. Today we’re somewhere along the transition between “graphics” defaulting to meaning traditional tools vs. computer tools. Maybe we’re 70/30, maybe we’re 30/70. One thing’s for sure, the default meaning lags whichever toolset is actually more common by a couple decades at least. And the default meaning in the relevant professional world will change a couple decades before it does in common citizen usage. Bonus question: If we use the term “ink pen”, as many people do, that ought to be in contrast to some other sort of pen. What are these other pens? Not a trap question; I genuinely don’t know. If its just a silly-ism then I suggest we write to the Central English Language Standards and Homogenization Enforcement Agency (CELSHEA) to demand they put this right immediately. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/70 "2017-02-24T19:09:05Z")
But graphics are graphics and art is art. They are two separate things, aren’t they? (Also, I’ve never heard the term “ink pen”). ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/71 "2017-02-24T19:27:05Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Bonus question: If we use the term “ink pen”, as many people do, that ought to be in contrast to some other sort of pen. What are these other pens? Pig. Hat. (In spoken communications, the pronunciations can be the same even if the spelling isn’t.) Now, there are probably not many situations where you are asking for a writing instrument and are handed an animal enclosure, but there are plenty of them where you can be handed a pointy metal fastening device. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2017, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599/72 "2017-02-24T19:31:43Z")
I wonder how the region where “ink pen” is a common idiom overlaps with the region where “pin” & “pen” are pronounced the same. Neither of those abominations were common when and where I grew up so they both grate on my ears a bit. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cg-versus-cgi-have-we-given-up/315599.md?page=3)