I highly doubt it. I’m sure it’s mostly the same technology he used in The Polar Expressionless. Cameron is onto something way more advanced and interesting. I’m rooting for him and cannot wait to see the results.
Seconding what Euthanasiast said.
Independence Day was created with a combination of minitures and some digital manipulation. The “behind the scenes” stuff actually paints that movie as old fashioned.
Beowulf looks to be about an order of magnitude better than The Polar Express, though. I watched a long trailer for it the other day, and it certainly didn’t seem like the actor’s faces were lacking in expression.
Almost all effects movies do it this way. Even the Star Wars prequels. Very few do not still use miniatures where appropriate.
Independence Day may be an old movie without thousands of photorealistic 3D rendered computer models like Star Wars, but it was still done using computers, and it is still considered a “special effects extravaganza” popcorn movie. Films like Titanic or T2 use cutting-edge effects shots, for sure, but not to excess. The brief list of flicks I gave were examples of eye-candy movies which have effects sequences in abundance. All of the films I gave as examples have extraneous sequences which are not plot-critical but were added simply for the sake of doing so. Cameron is notorious for his reputation to only make effects sequences if they are absolutely critical to the story.