10/27/04

Why Luxo, Jr. is the best piece of computer animation ever

From Pinoyexchange:

deathcradle: What has Pixar done na hindi Disney?

Luxo, Jr. (tho it was distributed by Buena Vista). Still Pixar's best, in my opine.

greatbop: uh... right the 2 minute demo that can be seen in Fiding Nemo DVD...yep.. it sure had excellent script writing.

You only need one good idea to tell a good story.

Luxo's an important film because it reminds us that emotions and story are far more important than innovative digital technique...something Dreamworks would do well to learn (they did with Shrek, but not much else).

I'm not too crazy about Pixar's brand of sentimentality, though; two minutes is about most I can stand. Finding Nemo's well-told, but give me the wild, anything-goes, nonsentimental quality of Spongebob and, come to think of it, Looney Tunes: Back in Action anytime.

greatbop: it's a 2 minute technical demo. that was that. facial expressions were next to nonexistent then too. the Ps2 could do a better job of rending the animation, too.

Oh rendering is nothing; that's a matter of how much money you want to throw at the computer. Luxor Jr. was important because for the first time, computer animation had a heart, it created characters, a mother and son, it created a delicate fairytale mood (using office desktop equipment) and it moved people.

And it did all this without facial expressions! That's the magic. Movement, the tilt of a lampshade, the slightest flicker of the power cable. Lasseter's artistry recalls an older art, that of puppetry, of bringing inanimate objects to life.

It's still one of the few pieces of computer-animation that can move people...one of the few pieces of computer animation that I actually like.

greatbop: i... c... so you're no fan of pixar.. no big deal.

No. Give me Studio Ghibli or Gainax anytime.

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