In this blog entry for the Herald, I ruminate on the stunning CGI seen in Disney’s new live-action version of The Jungle Book, and cite the five best CGI beasts to have come before.

The Jungle Book is a pretty awesome family-friendly movie enhanced in no small degree by the insanely realistic CGI renderings of the various animal characters that so famously populate Rudyard Kipling’s iconic stories.

It’s often much harder for audiences to suspend their disbelief when viewing artificially created versions of real-life animals due to our experience and familiarity with how they appear and move. Somewhat perversely, we are more likely to believe in the reality of a fantastical monster created with less care.

Capturing the indefinable yet unmistakable qualities of nature’s most impressive creations has long remained just out of reach of the technology. Until now.