Titanic splits and sinks : James Cameron's $200 million movie VS our $1,000 miniature. Comparison !

Camera angles comparison of the splitting and sinking of the RMS Titanic between the film directed by James Cameron in 1997 and our video.

Cameron mainly used a 1:8 scale stern for the breaking and final sinking scene.
We used a 1:200 Trumpeter Titanic upgraded with KA MK1 set kit.

We don't pretend to recreate the movie, it's just for fun and to pay tribute to the work of the film crew :)

0:00 Titanic breakup scene comparison
0:43 Titanic stern sinks scene comparison
1:30 Behind the scenes comparison

Model construction video here:

Titanic break-up, behind the scenes:

Titanic stern sink, behind the scenes:

Photo credits:
Pinterest
Sophie Ebrard

[CerveloR]

So this video is showing how back in 1997 the visual effects that James was able to obtain was simply mind boggling. He truly hit it spot on!

[theturtlearchives]

Keep in mind James' version was done with 1997 tech, not with 2023. The film just doesn't age, it looks so good.

[milers.c.]

Only water gives away the size of this ship. The rest is just fabulous!

[joserobertorodriguez]

This is so cool! This would be great assignment for film school. One would learn so much. Not only about planning a shot sequence but also on how to carry it out. There is editing, frame rate, scale, and color editing. Simply perfect! A gate way into modeling, film making, and VFX. Old school is good school.

[MisatoBestWoman]

*The special effects of this movie will forever be incredible!, the amount of work that went into this is amazing!*

[HenryLaw]

I'll never forget that man who fell and hit the propeller blade. 😅

[therepublicofwozmania]

The only thing that gave away the fact your’s was a model was the stern splashing into the water and that there were no people on the ship. Other than that this looks almost exactly like the 1997 movie!

[Elzorroastuto]

It is a very good video and an excellent replica

[cwilliamsphoto]

Fantastic job! And more evidence that water doesn't scale, which was one of the main reasons for making everything so big in the movie...but you already knew that ;) The ship and filming though...damn good!

[RobloxianX]

A fine example as to why having large ship models matters when working with water. Surface tension is key!

[arun_kumar]

like i said earlier... the only thing which gave away the illusion was those water splash... plus add some people in there for scale reference... it will look just like the original one... and also reduce the shutter speed (if you are shooting with 120fps or 240fps)... don't go for that industrial standard, 180degree shutter speed... its the motion blur which will help to blur out those perfectly crafted plastic ship... trust me it will look flawless 😇

[TheGreekPianist]

OH MY GOD! That is absolutely phenomenal! You captured so many of the scenes so identically! Please recreate more epic scenes from Titanic, because you’re brilliant at it! I can tell you put so much high quality and time into this. You’re so talented, please keep it up! 🚢

[morefifacollege]

I been obsessed about studying the Titanic passed few months!

[handlenottaken]

I loved the model version as much as the movie one, great job, all it needs when the stern strikes the water is a bit of foaming from the water.

[cinefex]

Love it! One thing you could keep in mind for future projects: The close-up shots were shot with the aperture too wide open, which results in a narrow focus range, which in turn negatively affects the impression of size. Here you would have had to close the aperture until everything was sharp and then adjust the lighting.

Fire and water are Miniature Effects Specialists nightmare since they don't scale very good. You can't solve this with practical effects under a certain model siz. Even in Camerons orginal the water splashing looks out of scale.

[Gojira]

I think James Cameron is gonna be so so so happy for that!

[mindlesswriter]

Cameron is incredible for him to capture that moment for 1997 is still so incredibly impressive

[rashad]

Wow, very impressive!! That was great.

[patricknehmetallah]

Did you consider trying to add lights to light up the funnels? It might add to the realism when the lights go out. Just a thought. Looks fantastic!

[Masonfisher-icnl]

That is insanely accurate to the movie