3Ds is used to make very realistic models with bump mapping and raytracing to capture realistic lighting effects onto polys. 3ds max is the most widley used 3D animation program according to the Roncarelli report. It has strong modeling capabilities, a easy to use plugin archive and a long heritage on the Microsoft Windows platform. It is mostly used by video game developers, TV commercial studios and architectural visualization studios. It is also used for movie effects and movie pre-visualization.

Swift 3D:

Swift is used in conjunction with flash to make vector like 3d models, these models can then be added into flash to make animations with low file sizes or they can be exported through flash into dreamweaver to make really nice looking web sites.

Cinema 4D:

cinema 4d is a commercial cross platform high-end 3D graphics application produced by MAXON Computer GmbH. It is capable of procedural and polygonal/subd modeling, animating, lighting, texturing and rendering, and is noted for being very easy to use and artist friendly among high end 3D applications and having a very flexible interface.

Application Programming Interface (API) is an older technology that facilitates exchanging messages or data between two or more different software applications. API is the virtual interface between two interworking software functions, such as a word processor and a spreadsheet.

The software that provides the functionality described by an API is an implantation of the API. The API itself is abstract, it specifies an interface and the behavior of the identifiers specified in that interface; it does not specify how the behavior may be implemented.

There are two general kinds of API publishing policies that are often encountered:

1. Some companies protect information on their APIs from the general public. For example, sony used to make its official playstaion 2 API available only to licensed PlayStation developers. This enabled Sony to control who wrote PlayStation 2 games. Such control can have quality control benefits and potential license revenue.
2. Some companies make their APIs freely available. For example Microsoft makes the microsoft windows API public and Apple releases its APIs Carbon and Cocoa so that software can be written for their platform

http://www.sei.cmu.edu/str/descriptions/api.html

WHAT IS A GPU?

A graphics processing unit is a graphics rendering device for a PC, Workstation or game console. Modern GPUs are very efficient at manipulating and displaying computer graphics. More than 90% of new desktop and notebook computers have integrated GPUs, which are usually far less powerful than their add-in counterparts.

A GPU is a type of CPU attached to a Graphics card dedicated to calculating floating point operations.There have been many companies producing GPUs over the years, under numerous brand names. The current dominators of the market are AMD manufacturers of the ATI Radeon and ATI FireGL graphics chip line and NVIDIA manufacturers of the NVIDIA Geforce and NVIDIA Quadro graphics chip line.

WHAT IS A SHADER?

A shader in the field of Computer Graphics is a set of software instructions, which is used by the graphic resources primarily to perform Rendering effects.

radiosity provides soft edges, colour displacement and realistic shadows however with a normal light you get really hard edges and just the basic shadow

 until later on when the Z axis was introduced. This third axis enables us to locate any point in three-dimensional space.

View portsThey allow you to see a three-dimensional shape in different ways.

in 1972 Nolan Kay Bushnell the famous Pong  arcade game. John Whitney Jr and Gary Demos Created the very first computer graphics film. in 1974 a man named Edwin Catmuff created texture mapping and the Z-buffer hidden-surface algorithm, also James Blinn invented 3D curved surfaces and  the refinement of texture mapping, in 1976 he also invented enviroment  mapping and bump mapping.

in 1982 Steven Lisberger created Tron the  first Disney movie which makes extensive use of 3D computer graphics. in  1984 Wavefron tech.  created  Polhemus, the  first 3D graphics software. in the years following quite a few things where created these were:

 in 1990 Hanrahan and Lawson created a piece of software called Renderman this was used in 1991 by Disney and Pixar to create Beauty and the Beast, a movie that used alot of CGI.in 1993 University of Illinois created Mosaic, the first graphic Web browser, also Steven Spielberg directed Jurassic Park, a very successful CG fiction film. in 1995 Buena Vista Pictures created the famous Toy Story movie, the first full-length, computer-generated, feature film and the NVIDIA Corporation introduced the GeForce 256 and GeForce3(2001)

In the 1950’s, output are via teletypes, lineprinter, and Cathode Ray Tube (CRT). Using dark and light characters, a picture can be reproduced.

• 1950: Ben Laposky created the first graphic images, an Oscilloscope, generated by an electronic (analog) machine.  The image was produced by manipulating electronic beams and recording them onto high-speed film.
• 1951: UNIVAC-I: the first general purpose commercial computer, crude hardcopy devices, and line printer pictures.
• 1951: MIT – Whirlwind computer, the first to display real time video, and capable of displaying real time text and graphic on a large oscilloscope screen.

In the 1960’s, beginnings of modern interactive graphics, output are vector graphics and interactive graphics.  One of the worst problems was the cost and inaccessibility of machines.

• 1960: William Fetter coins the computer graphics to describe new design methods.
• 1961: Steve Russel –  Spacewars, first video/computer game
• 1963:
  • Douglas Englebart – first mouse
  • Ivan Sutherland  – Sketchpad, interactive CG system, a man-machine graphical communication system, it features:
    • pop-up menus
    • constraint-based drawing
    • hierarchical modeling
    • utilized lightpen for interaction

He formulated the ideas of using primitives, lines polygons, arcs, etc. and constraints on them; He developed the dragging, rubberbanding and transforming algorithms; He introduced data structures for storing.  He is considered the founder of the computer graphics.

• 1964: William Fetter — first computer model of a human figure.
• 1965: Jack Bresenham – line-drawing algorithm
• 1968:
  • Tektronix – a special CRT, the direct-view storage tube, with keyboard and mouse, a simple computer interface for $15, 000, which made graphics affordable
  • Ivan Sutherland – first head-mounted display

• 1969:
  • John Warnock – area subdivision algorithm, hidden-surface algorithms
  • Bell Labs – first framebuffer containing 3 bits per pixel

In the early 1970’s, output start using raster displays, graphics capability was still fairly chunky.

• 1972: Nolan Kay Bushnell – Pong, video arcade game
• 1973: John Whitney. Jr. and Gary Demos – “Westworld”, first film with computer graphics
• 1974:
  • Edwin Catmuff –texture mapping and Z-buffer hidden-surface algorithm
  • James Blinn – curved surfaces, refinement of texture mapping
  • Phone Bui-Toung – specular highlighting

• 1975:
  • Martin Newell – famous CG teapot, using Bezier patches
  • Benoit Mandelbrot – fractal/fractional dimension

• 1976: James Blinn – environment mapping and bump mapping
• 1977: Steve Wozniak —  Apple II, color graphics personal computer
• 1979: Roy Trubshaw and Richard Bartle – MUD, a multi-user dungeon/Zork

In the 1980’s output are built-in raster graphics, bitmap image and pixel. Personal computers costs decrease drastically; trackball and mouse become the standard interactive devices.

• 1982:
  • Steven Lisberger – “Tron”, first Disney movie which makes extensive use of 3-D computer graphics
  • Tom Brighman – “Morphing”, first film sequence plays a female character which deforms and transforms herself into the shape of a lynx.
  • John Walkner and Dan Drake – AutoCAD

• 1983: Jaron Lanier – “DataGlove”, a virtual reality film features a glove installed with switches and sensors to detect hand motion.
• 1984: Wavefron tech. – Polhemus, first 3D graphics software
• 1985:
  • Pixar Animation Studios – “Luxo Jr.”, 1989, “ Tin toy”
  • NES – Nintendo home game system
• 1987: IBM – VGA, Video Graphics Array introduced
• 1989: Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) – SVGA, Super VGA formed

In the 1990’s, since the introduction of VGA and SVGA, personal computer could easily display photo-realistic images and movies. 3D image renderings are become the main advances and it stimulated cinematic graphics applications.

• 1990: Hanrahan and Lawson – Renderman
• 1991: Disney and Pixar – “Beauty and the Beast”, CGI was widely used, Renderman systems provides fast, accurate and high quality digital computer effects.
• 1992: Silicon Graphics – OpenGL specification
• 1993:
  • University of Illinois — Mosaic, first graphic Web browser
  • Steven Spielberg – “Jurassic Park” a successful CG fiction film.

• 1995:
  • Buena Vista Pictures – “Toy Story”, first full-length, computer-generated, feature film
  • NVIDIA Corporation – GeForce 256, GeForce3(2001)
• 2003: ID Software – Doom³ graphics engine

http://www.comphist.org/computing_history/new_page_6.htm

William Fetter (1928-2002), an art director who worked for Boeing, was a computer graphics pioneer and the first to draw the human figure using a computer (above).

He also Created the term Computer Graphics to describe the work he did at Boeing.

William Fetter was an adapter as he took the hardware and software that was available and used it to create something useful from it.

Pixar is is very close company, in which everyone listens to everyone else and when it comes to the plans for the story of a new animation, whether a full feature movie or a short animation, anyone who has an idea for a story can chime in and put their ideas out there, this gives the producers of the animation alot of options, and sometimes they will blend several story ideas together. what the producers try to get out of these story pitches is to try to find a story that will make the viewer believe in the idea.

 the story idea usually take about a week or two to complete.

The Text Treatment

the text treatment is a very short document that is pieced together which vaugely summerizes the story idea which has been chosen, this document is then passed to several departments, the script writers, storyboards, producers…

there can be several of these documents going round as at this point the final story has not been chosen, the script writers and the storyboarders will then add a bit more depth into these documents, this will help the producers finally decide the idea that they are going with.

 the text treatment usually only takes about 3-4 week to complete.

Storyboards

after the final idea has been decided the vague ideas are documented and given again to the storyboarders, then the storyboards are made, the storyboards are very small undetailed comic books that give an impression of what is going to happen in the scene, this includes a brief temporary script, temporary camera angles and temporary sounds 

 the story boards can take up to 5 months to complete.

Voice Talent recordings

this is the part where pixars hires celeb’s to come in  and record the lines for the storyboard, this is quite simple as they just need to record quick quotes as the this is just a vague impression given to  help the director get a final impression of the story.

this should take around 3 weeks.

 Script

 after the storyboard is complete the script writers start thinking of what they want the characters to say, this is one of the most lengthy parts of the animation production, as they have to think of every word carefully, because if the movie doesn’t sound right then the main target audience (children) are not going to understand of follow the movie.

the script can take anywhere from 4-6 months. 

artist rendering

after all of this it gets to the art department, in which the start to sketch and design characters and landscape designs for the movie