Drugs to combat sickness are being developed based on simulations of diseases.

Getting the Inside Story
The result, says Foster, is a "human story" that contains elements of humor, drama, sadness, and triumph. He thinks the film will appeal to a wide audience, saying that even a teenager with minimal knowledge beyond some cartoons and video games will be able to enjoy and learn from this film. Foster explains that the goal of the SIGGRAPH documentary is summarized by Ed Catmill, now head of Pixar, who worked unnoticed for many years, researching and developing technology that helped bring computer graphics to the attention of the entertainment industry. Catmull says, simply, "In the end, we got noticed." The Story of Computer Graphics reveals the great debt that today's dazzling feature films owe to the early pioneers in such fields as medical research and scientific visualization. It was because of the work of many research facilities that the technology developed to the point where the entertainment industry felt it was worth the risk to try it. Foster says that many stories of perseverance are presented in the film. For example, it tells of individuals who stood behind the first paint systems in the early 1970s, though they nearly lost their jobs. Also included is the 'true story' -- as opposed to the mythology one frequently hears -- of George Lucas' dream for the future of computer graphics, as told by Lucas himself. Foster says that The Story of Computer Graphics helps set the record straight, giving credit to the individuals who built the field throughout the years.

Another function of the film has been to make individuals and institutions more aware of the importance of computer graphic preservation. Foster notes that many people were surprised by how quickly materials from the 1970s and 1980s had decomposed. He says that "a lot of footage from the 1980s had faded. For example, Triple I's Juggler could barely be transferred. We had limited resources, so there was only so much material we could restore." Working with Michael Friend of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Film Study Center, Foster has made arrangements to store the component parts of The Story of Computer Graphics in a special preservation vault.

Fiat Lux by Paul Debevec of the University of California, Berkeley, is the subject of a technical paper at SIGGRAPH '99. It is a good example of some of the latest techniques which includes a process called, "Image-based Rendering."

How to Catch It
SIGGRAPH attendees who miss the film's debut at the Shrine can see it during its numerous screenings at the conference. The film will be shown five times each day, Monday through Thursday, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. More information on screening times can be found at www.siggraph.org/movie. After SIGGRAPH, the film will continue to be shown worldwide. Its next stop will be Eurographics, which is being held in Milan during September 1999. Because the documentary was created using high definition video technology, plans for a high definition television broadcast are also in the works, as are plans for distribution on DVD.

The documentary's production team also includes Executive Producers Carl Machover, President of the computer graphics consulting firm Machover Associates Corp., and John Hart, Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Washington State University. Producer Steve Silas, founder of 213TV Productions, is an ACE-nominated television producer and director, while the co-producer is longtime SIGGRAPH member and veteran visual effects producer Joan Collins. The documentary's writer, Judson Rosebush, founded Digital Effects Inc. in New York and is former American Editor of Pixel Vision Magazine and columnist for CD-ROM Professional.

Maureen Furniss, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor and Program Director of Film Studies at Chapman University in Orange, California. She is the Founding Editor of Animation Journal and the author of Art in Motion: Animation Aesthetics (John Libbey, 1998).