Re: Walkin' with Dinos

[Dinosaur Interplanetary Gazette <dinosaur@dinosaur.org>]

"Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." wrote:SNIPPED

P.S. As for the _T. rex_: it might look "sluggish", but it is definitely

> portrayed as active.  However, one item I encourage the animators to do:
> remember that this is a 5000 kg animal - it is got to look like there is a
> sense of mass to it as it moves.  (Part of the problem with older computer
> graphics is that there is no sense of gravity acting upon the objects).

Just to clarify the exact nature of this problem (less the poor animators or the
software gets blamed improperly)  the "dynamics" of computer animation has a
great deal to do with computing "power."  That is to say... in a given amount of
time with a given computer processor at a given budget, it may be physically
IMPOSSIBLE to render every aspect of the dinosaur.

For example...

A computerized animal is composed of (simply speaking) a skelton, muscle mass,
skin movement, skin texture, movement, "bounce," weight (and more). Each of
these aspects requires a certain amount of "power" and time to render.  On a
given budget, often some aspect has to be dropped. Often this is "texture" or
"weight" or "bounce."

My purpose here is to get the criticism focussed in the right place.  Perhaps
the problem was ignorance and bad management, but more likely it was a budgetary
consideration. Not everyone can afford ILM (not even Spielberg).

The new system for Disney Dinosaurs is truly remarkable in the degree to which
all of these aspects can be controlled and rendered, but it was extraordinarily
expensive and takes a tremendous amount of time to render each frame. That, I
suspect, is the problem here with the BBC animation: budget and time.

ES


>
>                 Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
>                 Vertebrate Paleontologist
> Department of Geology           Director, Earth, Life & Time Program
> University of Maryland          College Park Scholars
>                 College Park, MD  20742
> http://www.geol.umd.edu/~tholtz/tholtz.htm
> http://www.geol.umd.edu/~jmerck/eltsite
> Phone:  301-405-4084    Email:  tholtz@geol.umd.edu
> Fax (Geol):  301-314-9661       Fax (CPS-ELT): 301-405-0796

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