Let’s talk about why it looks fake.
I think it comes from the use of hydraulics. Biological muscle is way less linear (it works more like a second-order control system, where things often overshoot their target before dampening).
But one part of it may also be algorithmic: the robot’s Kalman filter (?) may correct for errors from sensor fusion much faster than a human would.
I would love a more informed opinion than mine though.
Watch the reflections on the plexiglass while they are moving. Obviously they could have been composited in but there's definitely a live portion of the shot.
I don't think "basic" is the right word.
So it is "animation" of a physical sort designed to make it look like the robots are responding to the music naturally, rather than programmatically.
On a dancing person you see all the slight adjustments to keep balance that make it feel natural, I believe these robots do it too fast for us to notice and so it seems like CGI where keeping balance isn't a thing.
Look at the pelvis movements at 1:15 to 1:25! You can clearly see it jerking around so the robot keeps its balance.
None of those movements are smooth or fluid, it's all jerky jittery and unnatural, which is exactly what you'd expect from actual robots. If it was motion-capture, you wouldn't get those movements, you'd get smooth human movements instead?
I'm so fascinated by how this video triggers people's "it's fake!" senses, when it's clearly real.
This is how the robot moves IN REALITY: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhND7Mvp3f4
In that video you linked, look at second 21/22, when it raises the arms in the air: the way the arms stop instantly is very inhuman.
Almost as though they had to edit out some balance-assisting device.
Also: why are the people at the right speed, but it feels like the robots are sped up? Them being sped up would be fine, but if the two are at different speeds then it’s a clear indicator that it’s composited.
Adam Savage: https://youtu.be/-R8wUybrspo?t=2374
Marques Brownlee: https://youtu.be/s6_azdBnAlU?t=249
I think this new video is trying to illustrate more of the highly dynamic capabilities of the machines that can be used by more specialized operators and software. (And I don't think there are any "effects" exaggerating those capabilities like you're implying, unless you mean things like color correction or the occasional cut to another piece of footage).
It would help a lot more to compare footage with real-world people interacting with the bipedal robot.
Maybe I misunderstood your comment but there are definitely videos of people interacting with Atlas (the bipedal robot) to the point that it's a running joke that they'll remember said interactions. See https://youtu.be/rVlhMGQgDkY?t=83
Cirque du Robots
I wondered if they covered the bots in a flowing dress if it would sell the illusion even more.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKjCWfuvYxQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3RIHnK0_NE
More than the smoothness, there just seems to be something off about the weight and momentum that you tend to see in high-end, big-budget-movie CGI, but it's hard to put a definite finger on it.
I think this is a similar effect but in reverse -- we know the limbs are heavy and aren't made of styrofoam, so the fact that they are moving like they are is uncanny. Our brains aren't used to motorized and hydraulic limbs.
You can get a little bit of this effect watching assembly line arms sometimes, but it's less jarring because they are clearly disembodied, whereas this thing is fairly humanoid.
Gollum moves as if his enormous head was empty, because the actor doing the motion capture didn't wear a heavy helmet.
In "Rust and Bones", Marion Cotillard plays a character that loses her legs after an accident, and she has her legs removed by CGI, but there are scenes where she's carried by Matthias Schoenaerts that look unnatural, out of balance.
Assuming the jump is about 30cm, and I stopwatched it at 0.3 seconds from the apex to the ground, you arrive at an acceleration of 9.6m/s^2 which is basically spot on the acceleration due to gravity.
As someone who works in the VFX industry, faking reflections on wobbling/flexing glass screens (static ones are easy) is actually pretty difficult to do right, and I doubt they would have added the camera operators if they were faking it.
Some of the aspects making people think this is CG are the diffuse lighting (no obvious hard shadows or occlusion), very clean robots, "weird" (i.e. not normal, but I believe it's honest for the robots) motion, and lack of sound.
It's kinda funny because most robot demo videos are sped up and/or CGI, but this one isn't.
Also, if you've followed Boston Dynamics for a while, what this video is showcasing isn't that much of a leap forward, they're just iterating away on their robots, adding capabilities and movement patterns.
There's a lot of shock rattling and wobbling I've never seen in any CGI robot animation, not to mention they are leaving visible indentations in the foam floor. If it was CG they really went all out.