Photorealism is a term used for a type of graphics used in many new games and on some films where CGI is needed.

Computer generated imagery (CGI) has come on leaps and bounds since it was initially used in the early 70’s for special effects. Early CGI was quite unrealistic and stood out in films as not being filmed footage however nowadays CGI can be blended in pretty well.

Photorealism CGI is not quite their yet and although many computer games are very close CGI images of people and animals are still not quite life-like.

True photorealism graphics need to look real both as a still image and when it moves. A good example of this being developed would be games such as Grand theft auto that is constantly trying to improve the realism of its game characters.

Most avid gamers believe that true photorealism is only about 5 years away from the open game market and will be so realistic that it will be hard to tell the difference between that and actual camera footage.