|
As early as the 1940s and '50s, experiments in computer graphics were beginning, most notably by John Whitney—but it was only by the early 1960s when digital computers had become widely established, that new avenues for innovative computer graphics blossomed. Initially, uses were mainly for scientific, engineering and other research purposes, but artistic experimentation began to make its appearance by the mid-1960s. By the mid-70s, many such efforts were beginning to enter into public media. Much computer graphics at this time involved 2-dimensional imagery, though increasingly, as computer power improved, efforts to achieve 3-dimensional realism become the emphasis. By the late 1980s, photo-realistic 3D was beginning to appear in cinema movies, and by mid-90s had developed to the point where 3D animation could be used for entire feature film production. ==The earliest pioneers: 1940s to mid-1960s== ;John Whitney John Whitney, Sr was an American animator, composer and inventor, widely considered to be one of the fathers of computer animation.〔(SIGGRAPH Whitney Profile page ) (retrieved 20 April 2012)〕 In the '40s and '50s, he and his brother James created a series of experimental films made with a custom-built device based on old anti-aircraft analog computers (Kerrison Predictors) connected by servos to control the motion of lights and lit objects — the first example of motion control photography. One of Whitney's best known works from this early period was the animated title sequence from Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 film ''Vertigo'',〔(Alex Through the Looking-Glass: How Life Reflects Numbers and Numbers Reflect Life )〕 which he collaborated on with graphic designer Saul Bass. In 1960, Whitney established his company Motion Graphics Inc, which largely focused on producing titles for film and television, while continuing further experimental works. In 1968, his pioneering motion control model photography was used on Stanley Kubrick's movie ''2001: A Space Odyssey'', and also for the slit-scan photography technique used in the film's "Star Gate" finale. All of John Whitney's sons (Michael, Mark and John Jr.) are also film-makers. John Whitney died in 1995. ;The first digital image One of the first programmable digital computers was SEAC (the Standards Eastern Automatic Computer), which entered service in 1950 at the National Bureau of Standards (NBS) in Maryland, USA.〔NBS is now known as the National Institute of Standards and Technology, or NIST.〕〔("Computer Development at the National Bureau of Standards." ) by Russell Kirsch, National Bureau of Standards, 31 March 2010.〕 In 1957, computer pioneer Russell Kirsch and his team unveiled a drum scanner for SEAC, to "trace variations of intensity over the surfaces of photographs", and so doing made the first digital image by scanning a photograph. The image, picturing Kirsch's three-month-old son, consisted of just 176×176 pixels. They used the computer to extract line drawings, count objects, recognize types of characters and display digital images on an oscilloscope screen. This breakthrough can be seen as the forerunner of all subsequent computer imaging, and recognising the importance of this first digital photograph, Life magazine in 2003 credited this image as one of the "100 Photographs That Changed the World".〔("Fiftieth Anniversary of First Digital Image Marked" ), Michael E Newman, ''Tech Beat (news release), NIST'', 24 May 2007 (retrieved 20 August 2012).〕〔("Square Pixel Inventor Tries to Smooth Things Out" ), Rachel Ehrenberg, ''Wired News'', 28 June 2010 (retrieved 20 August 2012).〕 :From the late 1950s and early '60s, mainframe digital computers were becoming commonplace within large organisations and universities, and increasingly these would be equipped with graphic plotting and graphics screen devices. Consequently, a new field of experimentation began to open up. ;Boeing-Wichita In 1960, William Fetter was a graphic designer for Boeing at Wichita, and was credited with coining the phrase "Computer Graphics" to describe what he was doing at Boeing at the time (though Fetter himself credited this to colleague Verne Hudson).〔(University of Washington History: William Fetter ) (retrieved 2012/04/20)〕 〔http://www.elysiuminc.com/gpdis/2014/DX28_Boeing-Kasik-Senesac-Visualization-DX-Open.pdf Boeing-Wichita〕 Fetter's work included the development of ergonomic descriptions of the human body that are both accurate and adaptable to different environments, and this resulted in the first 3D animated "wire-frame" figures. Such human figures became one of the most iconic images of the early history of computer graphics, and often were referred to as the "Boeing Man". Fetter died in 2002. ;Bell Labs Bell Labs in Murray Hill, New Jersey, was a leading research contributor in computer graphics, computer animation and electronic music from its beginnings in the early 1960s. Initially, researchers were interested in what the computer could be made to do, but the results of the visual work produced by the computer during this period established people like Edward Zajac, Michael Noll and Ken Knowlton as pioneering computer artists. Edward Zajac produced one of the first computer generated films at Bell Labs in 1963, titled ''A Two Gyro Gravity Gradient Attitude Control System'', which demonstrated that a satellite could be stabilized to always have a side facing the Earth as it orbited.〔(Edward Zajac on CompArt database ) (retrieved 2012/04/20)〕 Ken Knowlton developed the Beflix (Bell Flicks) animation system in 1963, which was used to produce dozens of artistic films by artists Stan VanDerBeek, Knowlton and Lillian Schwartz.〔Knowlton, K. C., "Computer Generated Movies," ''Science'', Vol. 150, (November 1965), pp. 116–1120.〕 Instead of raw programming, Beflix worked using simple "graphic primitives", like draw a line, copy a region, fill an area, zoom an area, and the like. In 1965, Michael Noll created computer-generated stereographic 3D movies, including a ballet of stick figures moving on a stage.〔Noll, A. Michael, "Computer-Generated Three-Dimensional Movies", ''Computers and Automation'', Vol. 14, No. 11, (November 1965), pp 20-23.〕 Some movies also showed four-dimensional hyper-objects projected to three dimensions.〔Noll, A. Michael, "A Computer Technique for Displaying n-Dimensional Hyperobjects", ''Communications of the ACM'', Vol. 10, No. 8, (August 1967), pp 469-473.〕 Around 1967, Noll used the 4D animation technique to produce computer animated title sequences for the commercial film short ''Incredible Machine'' (produced by Bell Labs) and the TV special ''The Unexplained'' (produced by Walt DeFaria).〔Noll, A. Michael, "Computer Animation and the Fourth Dimension", ''AFIPS Conference Proceedings'', Vol. 33, 1968 Fall Joint Computer Conference, ''Thompson Book Company'': Washington, D.C. (1968), pp. 1279–1283.〕 Many projects in other fields were also undertaken at this time. ;Ivan Sutherland Ivan Sutherland is considered by many to be the creator of Interactive Computer Graphics, and an internet pioneer. He worked at the Lincoln Laboratory at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) in 1962, where he developed a program called ''Sketchpad I'', which allowed the user to interact directly with the image on the screen. This was the first Graphical User Interface, and is considered one of the most influential computer programs ever written by an individual.〔(Sketchpad: A man-machine graphical communication system ) (retrieved 2012/04/22)〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「History of computer animation」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|