https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amAlcPqWYe4
Virtual MileHiCon attendees from all over Colorado logged on Friday afternoon as former Industrial Light & Magic supervisor Ed Kramer shared a talk about his personal history in computer animation. His presentation – titled Wizards of Hollywood – featured rare photos and video clips to illustrate the evolution of computer animation.
Starting with crude “analog” video animation, Kramer focused on the inventions of Denver’s own Lee Harrison III, one of the earliest computer animation company pioneers. He showed how Harrison’s analog inventions like Scanimate eventually were replaced by digital production tools like the Bosch FGS-4000, the Quantel Paintbox, and Wavefront Technologies software.
Kramer then described the many job functions it takes to do high-end CGI for feature films, referencing examples from his own work on two classic CGI films from 1999: The Mummy and Galaxy Quest.
The presentation concluded with Kramer showing the trailer from his documentary, also called Wizards of Hollywood. The film, currently in pre-production, introduces us to many of the artists behind the scenes in the early days of CGI, including their personal stories about working on Twister, Harry Potter, Jurassic Park, Terminator and other classic visual effects films at the dawn of computer animation.
Kramer is full-time Associate Professor at the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design in Denver, Colorado. In addition to teaching and producing his documentary, he serves as Chair of the SIGGRAPH Pioneers, a group of researchers, artists and educators whose members have each been working in the field of computer graphics for more than 20 years.
At this year’s virtual SIGGRAPH Conference, Kramer interviewed visual effects icon Douglas Trumbull for the Pioneers group. That interview can be found at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dDY_X0jhmE
