The Animation Options Blog

Today was the first full day of the SIGGRAPH 2008 conference in Los Angeles. One of the unexpected pleasures is this year’s Art & Design Gallery. My old friend Yoichiro Kawaguchi (pictured above) had an impressive display of new work including colorful, sea-creature-inspired resin sculptures done up in his inimitable surrealistic style. It was interesting to see how these have evolved from some crayon sketches that Kawaguchi showed at his talk in Taipei during the fall of 2005.

My favorite portion of the gallery was the “Design & Computation” area - examining analytical & generative methods for design, and exploring design & fabrication technologies. Rapid prototyping was in pervasive use, featuring structures that could only be expressed with the aid of digital technology. The curation was suitably low-key, letting the work speak for itself (very profoundly at that). Of particular note is the conceptual and aesthetic intersection between textiles and architecture (”woven buildings”), which was very evident in this show. While the work may strike some as impersonal, it is to me the purest expression of a thought possible. And given our daily interaction with textiles and architecture, very “personal” indeed.

After lunch, I joined most everyone else at the conference over in Hall B for Ed Catmull’s keynote address. Ed touched on a number of topics in his reflective, erudite address on “managing the creative environment”. One of the first things he brought up is the widespread lip service that everyone in our industry pays to the “Story is king.” mantra - whether they are creating good stories or not. (In fact, it was funny during a later talk to hear a speaker rattle off, “Of course, we all know story is king.” as though he just had to get that obligatory observation out of the way.)

Ed discussed many aspects of animation production that I cover with my consulting clients, including: how successes mask problems, how complexity is best addressed with rigorous organization but free communication, the importance of community, and the primacy of people over ideas. However, one thing I’d like a bit more information on is the creation of a “safe” creative environment for artists and directors. Ed made the point (which I’ve heard many times before) about how directors are not required to act on notes from their colleagues and/or executives - that directors are trusted to make the best decision for their films based upon a consideration of critical notes weighed against their vision for the project. So, what then brings about the removal of a Jan Pinkava or a Chris Sanders? Who makes this call, and based on what criteria? And if the precedent of the axe is looming, how “safe” can any creative ever truly feel? (I posed these questions directly to Ed and John at a meeting once upon a time, but never really got an answer.)

Inquiring minds want to know!

Now you can stream 4k like a river.

Boxx Technologies has released the RTX 8400 Series, designed to give digital intermediary and compositing workloads a good smack down. The RTX 8400 features dual quad-core Intel Xeon 5400 Series processors and offers the freedom to play back 4K, 2K and HD at full resolution, in real-time.

The system takes advantage of key features in popular digital intermediary, compositing and color grading applications such as Assimilate Scratch, Iridas Speedgrade, Autodesk Toxik, Autodesk Combustion, and eyeon Fusion. The RTX 8400 features a scalable, high-performance, internal storage sub-system that achieves the high-speed disk throughput required for work with uncompressed multilayer 4K, 2K, HD, SD, or HDV material.

The RTX chassis is designed to house up to 24 hot-swappable data drives in addition to two system drives. The RAID-configured drives can generate up to 1GB/s of data throughput.

Pretty sweet!

While in Taipei this February, I had the pleasure of visiting Kim Chin, Planning Engineer at the Institute for Information Industry. The “III” has established a Digital Content Institute in Nankang Software Park for the purpose of talent cultivation, industry support, knowledge sharing and international cooperation. Kim was kind enough to make time in her busy schedule for a tour.

The Digital Content Institute has remarkable facilities and extensive industry contacts (both within Taiwan and internationally), integrating industrial and academic courses, attracting guest lecturers and instructors from around the world, and providing state-of-the-art tools and training. An “Industrial Advisory Board” and “Professional Courses Committee” supervises course design in order to ensure a curriculum that is relevant to the continued growth of Taiwan’s animation industry. Taiwanese instructors are afforded the opportunity to receive higher-level training overseas, and an extensive “on-the-job” training partnership is available for students with game, animation, A/V, internet, mobile and software companies throughout Taiwan, such as CGCG.

The progressive goal of the Digital Content Institute is to incubate the next generation of talent for Taiwan’s animation studios and academic institutions. During my visit, I was impressed with the DCI’s “Xbox Game Development Center”, state-of-the-art motion capture and bluescreen studios, multi-media production environment and digital content library.

To learn more about this remarkable institution, its mission and its many programs, check out their website at: http://www.dci.org.tw/english/index.htm

Marjane Satrapi’s Oscar-nominated animated feature “Persepolis“ is an unlikely and remarkable film. Imagine trying to pitch the story of a young Iranian girl growing up during the 1979 Islamic Revolution to a roomful of Burbank animation executives: descriptions of torture, animated executions, a punk & heavy metal soundtrack, and no wacky sidekicks (save for God as a comic foil). Oh, and by the way… it’ll be 2D and in black & white. You can just hear the minds (and wallets) snapping shut.

Yet with her life and graphic novel as source material, Satrapi has (for 10% the cost of the average Hollywood gag fest) created an enlightening work of truly “adult” animation: an arresting, tragicomic view of a world gone mad as seen through the eyes of a young girl and woman-to-be. And while Muslim fundamentalists have predictably been up in arms about the film, the reception throughout Europe and the United States has been phenomenal. Although ultimately nominated in the Academy’s Animated Feature Category, “Persepolis” was selected as France’s official submission in the Foreign-Language Feature Category, and had racked up numerous other nominations & awards prior to its U.S. release last Christmas by Sony Pictures Classics.

At the heart of Marjane Satrapi’s achievement is the very sort of personal filmmaking that I advocated to an audience of filmmakers & government officials in Beijing last December. By conveying an extremely political story in the most accessibly personal way, Satrapi “unveils” universal truths about the best and worst of human nature. As the director herself observes: “What is interesting to me is that anywhere we show the movie, the reaction is the same. I’ve always said that my story is humanistic. It goes beyond Iran. Even people who don’t live in repressed societies relate to the story of one family. It’s about celebrating things that we all have in common.”

Truly inspirational filmmaking in a year of surfing penguins and rodent fry cooks.

150-inch plasma screen unveiled by Panasonic at the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show. What more is there to say?

Only this: be sure to mount a plastic owl on top to keep birds from flying into it!

Liti Holographics has a remarkable “New Generation Hologram” process capable of creating full-color, high-resolution 3D prints that have a 120-degree viewing zone and can display up to five seconds of animation. Imagine vibrant, dimensional posters that appear to come to life as you walk by!

Unlike lenticular images, which have fairly shallow 3D depth and jerky motion, New Generation Holograms are fully 3D and appear to “project” from the image. Using a combination of pulsed lasers and full-color continuous wave lasers, Liti Holographics is able to produce holographic stereograms that allow artists and designers to incorporate a variety of special effects, including full animation.

Look for animated characters and dunking basketball players on posters at multiplexes and sporting goods stores near you.