It's because back then the 120 / 130 IQers were in computer sci. Now the 100 IQers are into comp sci so the average visuals get bogged down because the average creator isn't as intelligent.
I also agree. I'm always looking up old CGI. I think it's just down to a revolution being more pioneering and exciting to be a part of while its breaking. Many of these old cgi clips were made with brand new tools the animators themselves had made and new ground was being laid. One the products that led to the industry's commercialisation reached a viable maturity the truly febrile, fertile period dwindled. Todays computer animated films don't seem to be achieving something quite so innovative.
@@xpez9694 Yeah at least "AI is the new computer graphics". Still in defence of the past though many of the techniques, such as Neural networks, date back at least as far as computer graphics. Like graphics a lot of it still rides on work done in the 1970s and early 1980s.
That is SO awesome. So much work has gone into evolving CGI to the point that it looks as photorealistic as possible complete with the shaky handheld camcorder look that the inherent beauty of luminescent polygons and mechanical pans and dollies has disappeared. Ask any fan of retro video games and the clearly computer-generated graphics have, unto themselves a certain aesthetic which, I believe, should be revived. It might be considered Electronic Classicism, if I were an art scholar.
I saw this in the early 80's in a special screening in 3D. I don't know if it was every publicly shown in 3D, but it may have been the first stereoscopic 3D computer graphics animation.
Steve, I designed and directed this little film. It was not a commercial but a demonstration film for a 3D video system. It was shown at trade shows and conventions. The system was very crude but worked pretty well. The viewer wore glasses that were connected to a sync box. The two different “views” were projected interlaced at 30 FPS between a left eye view and a right eye view. The sync box allowed the left side image to be viewed while blocking the right eye and visa versa, 15 times for each eye per second. Think of two Venetian blinds clacking away in opposition while your brain blended the two views into one 3D image. I used to joke that Panasonic should provide logo drool bibs for the viewers. 1;28 was about all you wanted for the experience. We didn’t have a preview system so we produced 3D slides in B&W to use in a stereopticon, like a turn of the century view of Yosemite or Yellowstone. It was cutting edge and vintage all at the same time. We were inventing everything, every 14-16 hour day.
@@randyroberts706 It's great to hear from you, I have been a fan since I saw High Fidelity at Siggraph and that was a big inspiration to my animated film Dance of the Stumblers: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-7bQJu97qxLw.html also shown at the Siggraph Electronic Theater, And I have been showing the making of Brilliance in my history of animation classes. You and Bob were such visionaries.
Fantastic work Steve. I can see that you actually have a hyper imagination and......an incredible ear for music. The subtleties of the track pushing the visuals is not lost. I used to put the track on the audio head of a moviola and clear leader on the picture side. Then play the track over and over while marking the leader with colored grease pencils. One color for bpm another for down beats, another for up beats and accents. A squiggly line for acending movements and another for descending. Then putting the leader in a sync block and measuring exactly what was going on in the track as to frame number. I suspect you had a similar approach because the visual and audio hits are spot on. Also the mood changes are absolutely perfect.. beyond Panasonic and High Fidelity, I directed about 500-600 commercials. Then, I found myself in a position at Rhythm and Hues to do some personal work again. Our local PBS radio station, KCRW which was the sound track of my life while drawing storyboards wanted to advertise in art house theaters. I responded with a couple of promos for them. I’ll track them down and send them. Thank you for sharing. Great story, great animation.
Steve, look for KCRW Sticks and Stones. I animated it to Nat King Coles L O V E. When finished we searched for a version to put against the picture. My producer without my knowledge sent it to his estate who saw the work pic against NKC’s track and said, “just use that, it’s already done”.
@@randyroberts706 Thank you for your generous comments. Yes, I read a 16mm mag track and made notations almost the same as you described (I shoulda used colored grease pencils). I didn't have access to a moviola, so I threaded the track through my B&H projector which dragged it past my squawk box. I would love to continue this discussion, but not on a public forum. You can find my email at my website www.segaltoons.com
I think I saw this during an episode of 3-2-1 Contact when I was a kid. If this was the same video, then I think I this was the very video that inspired me to consider working with computer graphics.
+Nik Neuy Yes, it was done by pixels. It's a computer. And to the one who uploaded the video, could you please redo it, 240p cannot give us the true beauty of that animation.
Now a days all the motion graphic companies ONLY want to mimic stuff like this because its so "cool" & "ironic"....with no shared spirit of the originators who were just trying to do something they haven't seen before with the tech of the day.
like its so much better now, I'm 40, I was in diapers still and seems to me somebody took this over during the 90's and did an ok job, I think if they had talented people doing it what we would see now would be better than this, but thats all these idiots do take credit for somebody elses work and ruin it but since they are regurgitating the ideas the original creators and artists made it still turns out nice
This article expains it all: ohiostate.pressbooks.pub/graphicshistory/chapter/6-5-robert-abel-and-associates/ To summarize, Robert Abel & Associates (who produced this animation) used an Evans & Sutherland PS2 graphic workstation terminal to make this. Evans & Sutherland was a pioneer in developing computer graphics hardware--one of the namesake co-founders, Ivan Sutherland, is known well in computer history circles as the man who developed "Sketchpad", the first drawing program, in 1963 on the MIT/Lincoln Labs TX-0 computer (using a light pen on it's screen, in addition to a bank of function switches alonside the display). And the PS2 was a culmination of the developments of E&S' previous products, going back to their first, the LDS-1 graphic display (also vector/wireframe based) in 1968 (which E&S and others used to develop some of the first computerized flight simulators). The PS2 was capable of quite fine and crisp monochrome wireframe graphics as beautifully presented here (with the colors done optically with colored filters), thanks to it's vector-traced CRT display). Abel & Assoc would also use the PS2 for many other commercials and other SFX projects, and also used it as a "pre-visualization" tool for developing projects (their original intention for Abel & Assoc. acquiring a PS2).
