Computer Animation Quotes

I don't even know how computer animation works, honestly, and I don't need to. ~ Dan Scanlon

Even if you have money, access to MoCap technology, and strong choreographic and computer-animation abilities, don't try to make a film like this if you don't have a lot of patience, perseverance and a deep affinity for risk-taking. ~ Martine Epoque

Computer animation is one way to liberate people from their circumstantial gravity, and it is one way to give them mental freedom. ~ Cai Guo-Qiang

Sure, they were simple desk lamps with only a minimal amount of movement, but you could immediately tell that Luxo Jr. was a baby, and that the big one was his mother. In that short little film, computer animation went from a novelty to a serious tool for filmmaking. ~ John Lasseter

First of all, computer animation is certainly a tremendous and viable medium today. But the warmth and personality derived from 2-D animation, in my opinion, cannot be surpassed. Certain stories lend themselves well to 3-D animation and I won't labor this with naming them, but in my bones, I still respond more emotionally to the artists feel in 2-D. You feel the 'actor' in the animator more personally ... it's hard to explain. ~ Richard Sherman

Animation, for me, is a wonderful art form. I never understood why the studios wanted to stop making animation. Maybe they felt that the audiences around the world only wanted to watch computer animation. I didn't understand that, because I don't think ever in the history of cinema did the medium of a film make that film entertaining or not. What I've always felt is, what audiences like to watch are really good movies. ~ John Lasseter

I've always been thinking in three dimensions, ever since I started working with computer animation in the early '80s. ~ John Lasseter

In a movie, it's often important to have aliens whose gestures and facial expressions can be 'read' by humans. And in the days before sophisticated computer animation, most extraterrestrial bit players were guys in rubber suits. Such practical considerations forced Hollywood's hand when it came to aliens - they look like us for good reasons. ~ Seth Shostak

Pixar has invented much of computer animation as it's known today, and I've been very lucky to be the first traditional animator to work with computer animation. ~ John Lasseter

Animation offers a medium of story telling and visual entertainment which can bring pleasure and information to people of all ages everywhere in the world. ~ Walt Disney

My wish is that we design the future of learning. We don't want to be spare parts for a great human computer. ~ Sugata Mitra

The brilliant British mathematician, eccentric, and computer pioneer Alan Turing came up with the following test: A computer can be said to be intelligent if it can (on average) fool a human into mistaking it for another human. The converse should be true. A human can be said to be unintelligent if we can replicate his speech by a computer, which we know is unintelligent, and fool a human into believing that it was written by a human. Can one produce a piece of work that can be largely mistaken for Derrida entirely randomly? ~ Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The computers in Atlantis were infinitely evolved as opposed to what we see today. The science, the technology, everything was really done with light. All processing was done with light, with crystal formations and structures. Electricity is much too slow. ~ Frederick Lenz

Animation should be an art ... what you fellows have done with it, making it into a trade ... not an art, but a trade ... bad luck. ~ Winsor McCay

It's very important to remember that it's your intellectual property; it's not your computer. And in the pursuit of protection of intellectual property, it's important not to defeat or undermine the security measures that people need to adopt in these days. ~ Stewart Baker

I managed to work for more than 50 years with just paper, pencils and film. My son's generation and the one coming up after can't work with just paper and pencils any more. I managed to avoid using a computer. I don't even have a cellphone. I feel lucky I managed to live like that. ~ Hayao Miyazaki

If I had not studied music, there would be no Macintosh computers today. ~ Jef Raskin

I put Post-It notes everywhere to remind me of everything. I stick a ton of them on my computer monitor, telephone, and wallet. The problem now is that there are so many of them that my mind has blocked them all out. So I now need Post-It notes to remind me to look at my Post-It notes. ~ Stephan Pastis

The moment we walk into the suite, Tommy descends on us. "The Queen's on the line. On Skype, Your Grace." Anxiety rings in his voice like the ping of a tapped crystal glass. "She's been waiting. She does'na like to be kept waiting."

I nod briskly. "Have David bring me a scotch."

"Oh, me too!" Henry pipes up.

"He'll have coffee," I tell Tommy.

And I think Henry sticks his tongue out at me behind my back.

I head into the library and he follows, seeming marginally closer to sober - at least he's walking straight and unassisted now. I sit behind the desk and open the laptop. On the screen, my grandmother looks back at me, wearing a pale pink robe, hair in rollers and a hairnet, gray eyes piercing, her expression as friendly as the grim reaper's.

This should be fun.

"Nicholas." She greets me without emotion.

"Grandmother," I return, just as flat.

"Granny!" Henry calls, like a child, coming around the desk into view. Then he proceeds to hug the computer and kiss the screen.

"Mwah! Mwah!"

"Henry, oh, Hen - " My grandmother swats the air with her hands, like he's actually there kissing her.

And I do my damnedest not to laugh at them.

"Mwah!"

"Henry! Remember yourself! My gracious!"

"Mmmmmwah!" He perches, grinning like a fool, on the arm of my chair, forcing me to shift over. "I'm sorry, Grandmother - it's just so good to ~ Emma Chase

The first human-to-computer uploads of 2100 will prove that a perfect simulation is the thing being simulated - that a silicon soul doesn't need a physical body to inhabit. So eventually everybody who ever lived will be resurrected inside a living machine indistinguishable from God. Isn't it amazing what you can do with unlimited hard-disk space? ~ Frank J. Tipler

Let's stick to the practical and the concrete: Would you like it if people lived in a virtual world? If machines were smarter than people? If, in the future, people, animals and plants were products of technology? If you don't like these ideas, then for you the computer and biological sciences clearly are dangerous. ~ Theodore Kaczynski

Microsoft is now talking about the digital nervous system ... I guess I would be nervous if my system was built on their technology too. ~ Scott McNealy

I made tons of films. I did animation for my friends' films. I animated scenes just for the fun of it. Most of my stuff was bad, but I had fun, and I tried everything I knew to get better. ~ Pete Docter

I would hope that we can load our moral computers with three elements of integrity: 1. Dealing justly with oneself. 2. Dealing justly with others. 3. Recognizing the law of the harvest. ~ James E. Faust

It does take some confidence, especially for the lay person, to feel that their intuitive understanding that the difference between white rice and brown rice is so small that it really doesn't matter what Harvard's computer says. ~ Richard David Feinman

Tori swiveled in her seat as we came in.
"There are more," she said. "He sent one every couple of weeks. The last one was only a few days ago."
"Good," I said. "Would you mind keeping and eye on Andrew?"
"Sure." She took off.
"Wait." I grabbed Derek's sleeve as he headed for the chair Tori had vacated. I wanted to say something. I didn't know what. But there was no way to tell him that wouldn't be much of a shock, so I ended up stupidly murmuring, "Never mind."
When he read what was on the screen, he went absolutely still, like he wasn't even breathing. After a few seconds, he yanked the laptop closer, leaning in to read it again. And again. Finally, he pushed back the chair and exhaled.
"He's alive," I said. "You're dad's alive."
He looked up at me and, I couldn't help it- I threw my arms around his neck and hugged him. Then I realized what I was doing. I let go, backing away, tripping over my feet, stammering, "I-I'm sorry. I'm just- I'm happy for you."
"I know."
Still sitting, he reached out and pulled me toward him. We stayed there, looking at each other, his hand still wrapped in my shirt hem, my heart hammering so hard I was sure he could hear it.
"There's more," I said after a few seconds. "More emails, Tori said."
He nodded and swiveled back to the computer, making room for me. When I inched closer, not wanting to intrude, he tugged me in front of him and I stumbled, half falling onto his lap. I tried to scramble ~ Kelley Armstrong

He stopped what he was doing and pulled out his magic phone.
Okay, the phone wasn't magic, but it does things my computer struggles with. ~ Patricia Briggs

The Ancestral Trail was split into two-halves of 26 issues each. The first half takes place in the Ancestral World and describes Richard's struggle to restore good to the world. After the initial international run, which sold over 30 million copies worldwide, Marshall Cavendish omitted the second part of the trilogy and used the third part (future) for the second series that followed. This part of the series, written up by Ian Probert and published in 1994, takes place in the Cyber Dimension. It deals with Richard's attempts to return home. Each issue centered on an adventure against a particular adversary, and each issue ended on a cliffhanger.
The Ancestral Trail was illustrated by Julek and Adam Heller. Computer-generated graphics were provided by Mehau Kulyk for issues #27 through #52. ~ Frank Graves

Through the computer, the heralds say, we will make education better, religion better, politics better, our minds better - best of all, ourselves better. This is, of course, nonsense, and only the young or the ignorant or the foolish could believe it.
~ Neil Postman

Computer monitors can operate in many different video modes. In most cases, the decision about how many pixels and colors to display is yours - but not always. ~ Charles Petzold

Poke the box How do computer programmers learn their art? Is there a step-by-step process that guarantees you'll get good? All great programmers learn the same way. They poke the box. They code something and see what the computer does. They change it and see what the computer does. They repeat the process again and again until they figure out how the box works. The box might be a computer or it might be a market or it might be a customer or it might be your boss. It's a puzzle, one that can be solved in only one way - by poking. ~ Seth Godin

At some point during my research, I came across the term "gender fluid." Reading those words was a revelation. It was like someone tore a layer of gauze off the mirror, and I could see myself clearly for the first time. There was a name for what I was. It was a thing. Gender fluid.

Sitting there in front of my computer--like I am right now--I knew I would never be the same. I could never go back to seeing it the old way; I could never go back to not knowing what I was.

But did that glorious moment of revelation really change anything? I don't know. Sometimes, I don't think so. I may have a name for what I am now--but I'm just as confused and out of place as I was before. And if today is any indication, I'm still playing out that scene in the toy store--trying to pick the thing that will cause the least amount of drama. And not having much success. ~ Jeff Garvin

The spectacular thing about Johnny [von Neumann] was not his power as a mathematician, which was great, or his insight and his clarity, but his rapidity; he was very, very fast. And like the modern computer, which no longer bothers to retrieve the logarithm of 11 from its memory (but, instead, computes the logarithm of 11 each time it is needed), Johnny didn't bother to remember things. He computed them. You asked him a question, and if he didn't know the answer, he thought for three seconds and would produce and answer. ~ Paul R. Halmos

Russians had a reputation for being the best programmers on Wall Street, and Serge thought he knew why: They had been forced to learn to program computers without the luxury of endless computer time. Many years later, when he had plenty of computer time, Serge still wrote out new programs on paper before typing them into the machine. "In Russia, time on the computer was measured in minutes," he said. "When you write a program, you are given a tiny time slot to make it work. ~ Michael Lewis

In her most recent project, she tested 356 children, ages five to ten, who were brought to Monell to determine their "bliss point" for sugar31. The bliss point is the precise amount of sweetness - no more, no less - that makes food and drink most enjoyable. She was finishing up this project in the fall of 2010 when she agreed to show me some of the methods she had developed. Before we got started, I did a little research on the term bliss point itself. Its origins are murky, having some roots in economic theory. In relation to sugar, however, the term appears to have been coined in the 1970s by a Boston mathematician named Joseph Balintfy, who used computer modeling to predict eating behavior. The concept has obsessed the food industry ever since. ~ Michael Moss

You don't have to believe everything you think."
- Chris Hardwick, "The Nerdist Way: How to Reach the Next Level (In Real Life) ~ Chris Hardwick

I love doing animation - mainly because you get to over-act. They're always saying "more," "louder," "bigger," "huger" and you just turn it lose. Plus, doing animation voiceovers, I have learned so much, and it's always good in your career to discover something you didn't know, and to learn to do things differently. So it's a fascinating experience. ~ David McCallum

Mostly, however, we've got it smooth and efficient now. We don't have to think. She says, 'What are you doing?', I peer at her with irritation and expel air, we go on about our business. This morning, though, she came upstairs to the attic here while I was sitting in front of the computer doing some work on the net.

'What are you doing?' she asks.

Trying to concentrate on something, distracted and harassed, I reply with some degree of acerbic aggravation.

'What does it look like I'm doing?'

There's a beat, during which we hold each others eyes, unblinking.

It's immediately after this beat has passed that I realize I'm wearing no trousers. ~ Mil Millington

The computer was the newest addition to the local library, and quickly had more viruses than the local whore house. ~ Giles Curtis

People in the computer industry use the term 'user,' which to them means 'idiot.' ~ Dave Barry

I love doing the voice of Batman because of the quality of the animation. The music is particularly incredible. Another bonus is getting the opportunity to work with some very respected actors who do not usually do voice work. ~ Kevin Conroy

Or is it the opposite-that the US has moved so far and so fast toward cultural permissiveness that we've reached a kind of apsidal point? It might be instructive to try seeing things from the perspective of, say, a God-fearing hard-working rural-Midwestern military vet. It's not that hard. Imagine gazing through his eyes at the world of MTV and the content of video games, at the gross sexualization of children's fashions, at Janet Jackson flashing her aureole on what's supposed to be a holy day. Imagine you're him having to explain to your youngest what oral sex is and what it's got to do with a US president. Ads for penis enlargers and Hot Wet Sluts are popping up out of nowhere on your family's computer. Your kids' school is teaching them WWII and Vietnam in terms of Japanese internment and the horrors of My Lai. Homosexuals are demanding holy matrimony; your doctor's moving away because he can't afford the lawsuit insurance; illegal aliens want driver's licenses; Hollywood elites are bashing America and making millions from it; the president's ridiculed for reading his Bible; priests are diddling kids left and right. Shit, the country's been directly attacked, and people aren't supporting our commander in chief.

Assume for a moment that it's not silly to see things this man's way. What cogent, compelling, relevant message can the center and left offer him? Can we bear to admit that we've actually helped set him up to hear "We 're better than they are" not as twi ~ David Foster Wallace

You look at these past predictions like there's only a market in the world for five computers [as allegedly said by IBM founder Thomas Watson] and you realize it's not a good idea to predict too far into the future. ~ Geoffrey Hinton

Poetic Terrorism
WEIRD DANCING IN ALL-NIGHT computer-banking lobbies. Unauthorized pyrotechnic displays. Land-art, earth-works as bizarre alien artifacts strewn in State Parks. Burglarize houses but instead of stealing, leave Poetic-Terrorist objects. Kidnap someone & make them happy. Pick someone at random & convince them they're the heir to an enormous, useless & amazing fortune--say 5000 square miles of Antarctica, or an aging circus elephant, or an orphanage in Bombay, or a collection of alchemical mss. ...
Bolt up brass commemorative plaques in places (public or private) where you have experienced a revelation or had a particularly fulfilling sexual experience, etc.
Go naked for a sign.
Organize a strike in your school or workplace on the grounds that it does not satisfy your need for indolence & spiritual beauty.
Graffiti-art loaned some grace to ugly subways & rigid public monuments--PT-art can also be created for public places: poems scrawled in courthouse lavatories, small fetishes abandoned in parks & restaurants, Xerox-art under windshield-wipers of parked cars, Big Character Slogans pasted on playground walls, anonymous letters mailed to random or chosen recipients (mail fraud), pirate radio transmissions, wet cement...
The audience reaction or aesthetic-shock produced by PT ought to be at least as strong as the emotion of terror-- powerful disgust, sexual arousal, superstitious awe, sudden intuitive break ~ Hakim Bey

By 2010 computers will disappear. They'll be so small, they'll be embedded in our clothing, in our environment. Images will be written directly to our retina, providing full-immersion virtual reality, augmented real reality. We'll be interacting with virtual personalities. ~ Ray Kurzweil

If some unemployed punk in New Jersey, can get a cassette to make love to Elle McPherson for $19.95, this virtual reality stuff is going to make crack look like Sanka. ~ Dennis Miller

Guess what - I am one of the ONLY senators in the whole United States Senate that is computer literate! ~ Patty Murray

Remember, ask and you shall receive. If you ask a terrible question, you'll get a terrible answer. Your mental computer is ever ready to serve you, and whatever question you give it, it will surely come up with an answer. ~ Tony Robbins

The goal of the computer is to provide people with the means to extend people's minds and bodies. It is an exoskeleton that expands our human reach. ~ Jean-Louis Gassee

When you work on a computer in the studio, it's almost like fossilizing on the spot, you know, the idea of getting solidified on the spot, like a snowflake might create branches by accumulation. ~ Rob Brown

I'd like to talk about free markets. Information in the computer age is the last genuine free market left on earth except those free markets where indigenous people are still surviving. And that's basically becoming limited. ~ Russell Means

I'm thinking of going to programming school. Learn how to sit down at any computer and learn to do anything on it. That's all I have left and have interest in. ~ Marc Wallice

I get fed up with plots that are driven by someone constantly getting information on a computer. ~ Liam Neeson

The most important thing about a technology is how it changes people. ~ Jaron Lanier

Early in the boob-emerging years, I had no boobs, and I was touchy about it. Remember in middle school algebra class, you'd type 55378008 on your calculator, turn it upside down, and hand it to the flat-chested girl across the aisle? I was that girl, you bi-yotch. I would have died twice if any of the boys had mentioned my booblets.
Last year, I thought my boobs had progressed quite nicely. And I progressed from the one-piece into a tankini. But I wasn't quite ready for any more exposure. I didn't want the boys to treat me like a girl.
Now I did. So today I'd worn a cute little bikini. Over that, I still wore Adam's cutoff jeans. Amazingly, they looked sexy, riding low on my hips, when I traded the football T-shirt for a pink tank that ended above my belly button and hugged my figure. I even had a little cleavage. I was so proud. Sean was going to love it.
Mrs. Vader stared at my chest, perplexed. Finally she said, "Oh, I get it. You're trying to look hot."
"Thank you!" Mission accomplished.
"Here's a hint. Close your legs."
I snapped my thighs together on the stool. People always scolded me for sitting like a boy. Then I slid off the stool and stomped to the door in a huff. "Where do you want me?"
She'd turned back to the computer. "You've got gas."
Oh, goody. I headed out the office door, toward the front dock to man the gas pumps. This meant at some point during the day, one of the boys would look around the marina office and ask, " ~ Jennifer Echols

I don't have the story finished and ready when we start work on a film. I usually don't have the time. So the story develops when I start drawing storyboards. I never know where the story will go but I just keeping working on the film as it develops. It's a dangerous way to make an animation film and I would like it to be different, but unfortunately, that's the way I work and everyone else is kind of forced to subject themselves to it. ~ Hayao Miyazaki

Considering the current sad state of our computer programs, software development is clearly still a black art, and cannot yet be called an engineering discipline. ~ William J. Clinton

A lot of the issues I faced in junior high was what got me into animation. It was easier to sit on the side and draw cartoons than to engage with people. ~ Pete Docter

The old Atlantean sciences from the tribe of enlightenment, of which there are only a few remnants and chards left in this world, were medicine, law, computers, and the performing arts. ~ Frederick Lenz