A Computer Animated Hand (1972)

Directed by

Edwin Catmull

Genre

documentary, animation

Country

United States

Runtime

6 min

Rating

6.7 of 10 from 20 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

This early computer animation shows a three-dimensional hand model rotating and moving. It demonstrates wireframe, halftone, and smooth shading techniques from the early 1970s.

experimentaltechnicalminimalistfuturisticprecisecoldslowabstract

What happens

A Computer Animated Hand is a 1972 American computer-animated short film produced by Edwin Catmull and Fred Parke. Produced during Catmull's tenure at the University of Utah, the brief was created as part of a graduate course project. After making a model of his left hand, 350 triangles and polygons were drawn in ink on its surface. The model was digitized from the data and laboriously animated in a three-dimensional animation program that Catmull wrote. The hand animation consists of three sequences, all of which rotate. The first is the data output of the hand (now called vertices) connected by lines (now called edges), but not filled with faces. The second is a halftone sequence that shows flat shading but lacks smooth shading. The final, completed animation, featuring organic, smooth shading of the surface between the data points, depicts the hand swiveling, opening and closing, pointing at the viewer, and tilting back, allowing the camera to move to the inside of the hand. The clip also features computer-generated animations of an artificial heart valve and human faces. Snippets of the animations were used in the 1976 Hollywood science fiction film Futureworld. The short film has been called groundbreaking and revolutionary for being one of the earliest examples of computer animation. Catmull went on to become a co-founder of Pixar and then its president, as well as president of Walt Disney Animation Studios in 2011. The film was inducted into the National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". Library of Congress scholars wrote: "In creating the film, Catmull worked out concepts that would become the foundation for computer graphics that followed." (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

• UFO's (1972)
• Metadata (1971)
• Pixillation (1970)
• Rectangle & Rectangles (1984)
• Particle Removal Series (1972)
• Pictures at an Exhibition (1972)
• The Long Bodies (1947)
• Canon (1964)