Buy It Now!

Read my review of RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES

Those damn, dirty apes look quite amazing in this 1080p/AVC MPEG-4 Blu-ray. This is certainly one of the best Blu-ray releases of the year. The picture quality is crystal clear adding great depth and detail. Weta's CG apes really stand out from fur to skin textures to their realistic looking eyes. The color palette is natural and clean with black levels inky throughout. There is a light film grain that runs through the picture, which does not increase during night scenes. Crush in those night scenes is also nonexistent. As for compression issues and other digital artifacts, they are completely absent.

The DTS-HD 5.1 Master soundtrack is just as impressive as the picture. The audio mix never misses a beat either in dialogue scenes or the epic action sequences toward the end. Ape growls and screams rattle the LFE track. Directionality is nicely handled, especially in the action scenes when spears come whizzing by the viewers and apes stampede past. Ambience is also handled wonderfully throughout whether it's quieter scenes in the redwood forest or the loud ape-filled cages of the animal sanctuary. Patrick Doyle's great score also surrounds the audience to great effect in getting the audience wrapped up in the plight of Caesar and his fellow apes.

sample content by Pablo Navarro

If you rightly suspect that there's more to good animation than 12 clearly defined principles then the book Animation Insiders is for you. And if you're strapped for cash or a starving artist, well - it's still for you because it's been published as a free eBook at les Shamans under the direction of Patrick Beaulieu.

For television, money eventually comes from ad sales. Advertising is what the acquisition executives, programming executives and development executives look toward when making a decision on content.  Will the show attract viewers? 

The Creators Project, founded in part by Vice Media, was started to showcase innovative artists and enable them to realize new artwork. “The Creators Project celebrates the connection between art and technology,” says David Haroldsen, a creative director for the project. “We set out to give people who use computers every day a look at artistic experiences that are only possible because of technology.”

When The Creators Project launched in 2010, Vice used a variety of media -- including television, print, online and mobile outlets -- to document the work of more than 100 creators to date, hailing mostly from seven countries (Brazil, China, France, Germany, South Korea, United Kingdom and United States). “In 2011, we pushed that concept forward by showcasing their work at events around the world, and by getting involved with the creators, their future and their creative process,” says Simon. “But we wanted to go beyond telling their stories. We wanted to help them take their work to the next level.”

The Studio, an ongoing arts initiative supported by The Creators Project, was created to do just that. “Think of The Studio as an art foundation,” says Simon. “It offers creators the means to realize their artistic visions. We foster interdisciplinary collaborations and give them access to the latest technology. Then we disseminate the work using a number of media channels and an event series.”

Click here to watch the latest trailer for Tim Burton's Frankenweenie.

A new trailer has been released for Tim Burton's Frankenweenie.  Come October 5th, we'll see how Burton's early live action short translates into a stop-motion feature.

William M. "Trip" Hawkins III - founder of Electronic Arts and father of the 3DO console - needs no introduction to serious gamers. But three decades after writing the blueprint for the PC and video game business, his latest creation - social games start-up Digital Chocolate  - is rewriting the rules again.

Originally a developer of games for mobile phones, the company has shifted its focus to Facebook and other social networks to tremendous success. It’s garnered more than 20 million monthly users within a year with hits like Millionaire City , MMA Pro Fighter  and NanoStar Castles . Here, Hawkins explains why he believes social gaming and virtual goods are the future of interactive entertainment.

By Matt Ployhar

It’s in the nation’s best interest to have a bright gaming future. Sound like a pretty bold declaration? Well, there are several things that have occurred over the past few years that have led up to my position that I’d like to share. You can then draw your own conclusions.

The keys to our future well-being are all about our ability to innovate. I originally started thinking in this direction when I was attending a private games summit a little over two years ago with several key industry execs. During the lunch conversation, several games ISVs (independent software vendors) observed that they couldn’t get their hands on enough H1B work visas and permits for foreign workers and students. The key reason they had to look outside the U.S. was that they could not fulfill the demand in their respective companies for employees with strong computer science, math and science skill sets.

Whether 3D moves beyond a stylistic evolution and becomes a revolution, though, has yet to be seen. As some developers and players note, the unique visual effect of 3D -- with the initial disorientation of viewing a scene with an illusion of depth and then continuing to direct the action -- can take some getting used to. However, the PC games that have made the jump to 3D run the gamut, including StarCraft II, Call of Duty: Black Ops, World of Warcraft and Duke Nukem Forever.

PC developers need to spend much less time tweaking the rendering effects in their games, as opposed to more than several months to rewrite a console game engine from the ground up to support 3D. And Mick Hocking, a vice president at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe and the head of the company’s 3D initiative, says that while some of the technology used to produce high-quality 3D displays has existed for a long time, it’s only recently become available at a consumer price point.

Epic Games founder Tim Sweeney

By John Gaudiosi

Twenty years ago, a very smart college kid named Tim Sweeney started releasing Shareware games that he made at his mom’s house. And at the 2012 D.I.C.E. Summit (i.e., Design, Innovate, Communicate, Entertain) in Las Vegas, Sweeney, the founder of Epic Games, was inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences Hall of Fame. Sweeney, who has been at the forefront of pushing technology forward with Unreal Engine 3, talks about how advances in processing power will continue to advance games.