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TechnoPop
This issue's TechnoPop
features two technology items that effect our daily, popular culture
driven lives with out our even noticing. Both are also receiving various
levels of awards from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
at this year's Scientific and Technical Awards in March. With the
first one, the Dolby Loudness Meter, we would certainly notice if
it was not there. The second item, RenderMan from Pixar Studios, we
notice when its obvious, but don't when it's not. Figure that one
out.
On a side note, all you techno artists and animators
should be aware that SIGGRAPH 2001 is coming to LA. If you don't know
what that is, click
here.
Here are some of the unique art opportunities that
SIGGRAPH 2001 will showcase and the deadline for entry: The CREATIVE
APPLICATION LAB, where attendees can play with computer and other
creative technologies, has an entry deadline of May 2, 2001. The COMPUTER
ANIMATION FESTIVAL which showcases computer graphics, has a deadline
of March 21, 2001. And finally, THE STUDIO, which features cutting
edge 2D and 3D out put equipment used for any application the artist
can dream up, has a deadline of March 28, 2001.
All the information you will need can be found at:
www.siggraph.org/s2001.
SIGGRAPH also needs student volunteers to help convention
goers get around as well as help out with all the cool stuff that
is going on.
Those of you who aren't interested in submitting
materials for the convention, might want to check it out anyway. There
is a lot of fascinating stuff to be seen including the Electronic
Theatre, which features the latest animation shorts and usually includes
a preview of Pixar's Academy Award ® entry.
Think of it as an art gallery of the future with
art you can actually touch. The exhibition is August 14-16, 2001 at
the LA Convention Center.
ED
HardWare
DOLBY'S SOUNDTRACK LOUDNESS METER
Making the world safer for theater goers
Three weeks before the
star studded event that is the Academy Awards , the Academy of Motion
Picture Arts and Sciences presents an entirely different type of
award to an entirely different type of star. At a banquet dinner
in Beverly Hills the technical geniuses that make films possible
rent tuxedos and limos and come out for the Scientific and Technical
Awards. These particular awards don't just have a single form of
award, they have three. In addition to the Oscar Statuette that
everyone knows so well, there is also a Technical Achievement Award,
in the form of a certificate, and a Scientific and Engineering Award,
in the form of a plaque.
The committee that selects these awards gives
them on the basis of the originality of the invention and the long-term
impact it has had on the industry. Once in a while a device is so
unique that it doesn't fall within the award description for any
of these levels, yet it has had such an impact on the film industry
that it demands attention. Such a device is the Dolby Soundtrack
Loudness Meter. I know what you're thinking. The films aren't too
loud, the trailers are. To which I say, exactly.
In 1997 the problem of trailer loudness was so
universal that cinema sound engineers, exhibitors and the major
studios formed the Trailer Audio Standards Agreement (TASA) to deal
with the problem. Enter Dolby Laboratories, who technically were
partially to blame for the loudness problem in the first place with
their DTS and SDDS formats, and they came up with the lovely Dolby
Model 737 Soundtrack Loudness Meter.
The meter is used during
soundtrack mixing to monitor loudness over time for the length of
the trailer. By mimicking the human ear's varying sensitivity to
sounds in different parts of the normal hearing range it "decides"
what is too loud. After the meter has "heard" the soundtrack being
measured, it displays an "annoyance factor" number, which allows
the editor to adjust for better audience listening pleasure.
Clearly while this is a fabulous thing, it doesn't
measure up to other sound inventions like DTS which broke new ground
on the invention front. It has been put together using previously
existing technology and its only effect on film is that people enjoy
them more now, even if they don't know why. That being said, the
Dolby Loudness Meter will be getting an Award of Commendation, rather
than a standard Scientific and Technical Award from the Academy
at the Scientific and Technical Awards this year, and I for one
salute them.
This is only the fifth Award of Commendation that
the Scientific and Technical Awards Committee has handed out in
its 73 year history. One went to a film restoration process, another
went to the union IATSE on its hundredth anniversary, yet another
went a man who made pyrotechnics safe for movie makers and last
year one went to a company that had developed an environmentally
safe way to dispose of motion picture prints. It would seem that
the Academy has been hiding its technological light under a star-studded
bushel all these years.
Jane Hinde
SoftWare
RENDERMAN FROM PIXAR
That thing that does that thing
A few month's ago we
did an article called, "What
the Hell is CGI" and in it I talked a lot about "rendering."
I even thought about doing an article called, "What the Hell is
Rendering?" Well, consider this article the natural extension of
that thought. .
Rendering is the process by which computer generated
3D objects are made into realistic looking 3D objects by using computer
generated light, shadows and shading. This goes for the hair on
animals and the wind blown look of grass in movies like DINOSAUR,
as well the life like shape of characters like Woody and Buzz in
the TOY STORY movies.
Rumor has it that in 1985 a film called YOUNG
SHERLOCK HOLMES was made as a testing ground for a new software
to be used for generating 3D images and effects in film. That software
was called Reyes (which stands for Render Everything You Ever Saw),
which was ground zero for the creation of the software called RenderMan.
It would be RenderMan that, five years later, would be used in almost
every major visual effects film made. Films like DEATH BECOMES HER,
TERMINATOR II, JURASSIC PARK, JUNGLE BOOK, THE MASK and MEN IN BLACK,
all of which set new standards for computer generated reality, have
RenderMan in common. If you count third party software, that is
software that produces RenderMan compatable files for rendering,
then you can also add THE MATRIX to that list.
Then of course there's
TOY STORY and TOY STORY II, the first of which won a Special Academy
Award® for John Lassiter for his leadership at Pixar which allowed
the production of the first feature length animated film. More importantly,
the films made animation fun again.
RenderMan was awarded a Scientific and Engineering
Award in 1992 for its cutting edge technology. In March the Academy
of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is giving it another award in
the form of an Oscar¨, this time to the three major contributors
who were responsible for the development and implementation of RenderMan.
The award is for their profound impact on the state of computer
generated imagery in film, and for the further impact made by making
the software accessible to the film industry. Think of it as a lifetime
achievement award for software. Three statuettes will be given for
this single award, to Rob Cook, Loren Carpenter and Ed Catmull,
who is CEO of Pixar.
Loren Carpenter is credited with pioneering the
field of procedural modeling, which uses complex geometrical formulas
to create complex shapes in the computer that could be transferred
to film. Ed Catmull weighs in with pioneering work in the invention
of texture mapping, which allows geometrical shapes to be molded
into recognizable shapes like dinosaurs. Finally, Rob Cook gets
credit for his pioneering work in the field of programmable shading,
which allows the shapes that Carpenter made possible and Catmull
made malleable to appear to have natural looking shadows and other
reactions to light giving the shape a real life look. No one of
these creations would be viable without the other two, and no film
today would have quiet the magic without the RenderMan package.
In this age of nerd revenge, the award of an Oscar®
to three software designers is a true coup.
Viva la Revolution!
