European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - March 11, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse                                A file photos scene from "2010" in which actor Kerr Dullea Ages radically after he touches spaceship computer top. Unrestrained movie making the computer As a camera by Richard de Atley associated press ick Jagger dances and sings through a southwestern Adobe House in the music video hard woman while a whimsical duo made of line images swirl about him. The House was created by a computer and detailed right Down to the Wood Grain in the doorposts. The line figures who act out the song Are also the computer s designs. In the movie 20/0, the same computer created the multicoloured surging Clouds of the planet Jupiter. Art mimicked life in images drawn from the detailed pictures of Jovian whorls sent Back to Earth by the voyager spacecraft. These effects Are some of the creations of digital productions the brainchild of filmmaker John Whitney tuesday March 11, 1986 or. And Gary demos who manage a team of 80 computer image specialists filmmakers and technicians and the world s most powerful computer a Cray amp that can make 1 billion computations a second. Digital productions won an Academy award for science and engineering in 1985 for the 2010 Clouds of Jupiter and for computer simulation of outer space dogfights in the last Star fighter. Of the six Cray amps employed the computer operated by digital is the Only one not being used by the government or the defense Industry Whitney said. The $12 million Cray has 3,400 circuit boards containing 200,000 microchips with 67 Miles of wire connecting the circuits. The cylindrical computer is about 6 /2 feet tall and five feet in diameter but weighs almost six tons because of the Copper tubing snaking through the system to carry coolant for the circuit boards. An average Home computer has about four circuit boards and 80 microchips. The Cray is backed up by six other computers to provide the details and fluid motion to images that include the at & t logo the lbs morning news logo with a Grid peeling away from the Golden letters and a series of commercials for Rockwell inc. So far digital productions has been producing its fanciful and detailed images for commercials corporate logos and scenes from movies. Whitney said his tool soon will have the Power to put together any image though creating a lifelike human face capable of showing the full Range of emotions still eludes the computer. The computer ultimately will be Able to show itself As a camera he said in a recent interview. It will mean there s no subject matter that can t be put into the computer and there s no Story that could not be told and there s no fantasy that can t be put onto the screen with a degree of truthfulness that would be  the key to such sharper images Are the polygons or Many sided figures that Are combined to make the larger image. Whitney and demos first program developed before they created digital was 50,000 polygons per image. At digital they have stepped up the polygons from 400,000 to 1.5 million polygons per image. Each Point of a polygon is coded into the computer. That information is used to build the Model of an object such As a face that can be manipulated. The More information that can be delivered in the shortest amount of time will produce the sharpest and most believable image hence the need for the Cray supercomputer. Unrestrained movie making is part of Whitney s life. The son of abstract filmmaker John Whitney or. And artist Jacqueline Blum he made a Point of avoiding College to learn the practical aspects of filmmaking. At his father s motion graphics inc., he made a Multi screen 17-minute film performance and Light show in 1967 that was eventually shown at the museum of modern Art. Whitney first became interested in computer graphics using electronic rather than mechanical methods to project images in 1972 when he saw the technique employed in a film produced by the University of Utah. Digital productions was founded in 1981 by Whitney and demos who had worked together at information International inc. They acquired the Cray amp and began producing award winning graphics. In 1984, they won a Clio award the advertising Industry s top prize for a commercial that took television viewers inside the Workings of a Sony Walkman tape player. Digital also won a new York International film and television Gold medal for creating the logo used by webs in Atlanta. The team at digital productions currently is working on what Whitney Calls the lowest common denominator for realistic graphics constructing Ordinary objects such As a vase or a table to make them look believable. I think the audience is More sophisticated in determining an effect to be truthful when it is looking at Ordinary subject matter Whitney said. It is the most difficult effect to make and we thought we had better address the most difficult task  the stars and stripes Page 13