Early Pixar: Luxo Jr.

From Wikipedia:

Luxo Jr. is the first film produced in 1986 by Pixar Animation Studios, following its establishment as an independent film studio. It is a computer-animated short film (two and a half minutes, including credits), demonstrating the kind of things the newly-established company was capable of producing.

It is the source of the small hopping desk lamp included in Pixar’s corporate logo. In a subsequent re-release after Pixar became popular, a pretext was added to the film reading, “In 1986, Pixar produced its first film. This is why we have a hopping lamp in our logo.”

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It was Pixar’s first animation after Ed Catmull and John Lasseter left ILM’s computer division and was also John Lasseter’s directorial debut. Lasseter’s aim was to finish the short film for SIGGRAPH, an annual computer technology exhibition attended by thousands of industry professionals. Catmull and Lasseter worked around the clock, and Lasseter even took a sleeping bag into work and slept under his desk[1], ready to work early the next morning. The commitment paid off, and against all odds it was finished for SIGGRAPH.

“Luxo Jr. sent shock waves through the entire industry – to all corners of computer and traditional animation. At that time, most traditional artists were afraid of the computer. They did not realize that the computer was merely a different tool in the artist’s kit but instead perceived it as a type of automation that might endanger their jobs. Luckily, this attitude changed dramatically in the early ’80s with the use of personal computers in the home. The release of our ‘Luxo Jr.,’ … reinforced this opinion turnaround within the professional community.” Ed Catmull, Computer Animation: A Whole New World, 1998.

NPR's New CEO

The new CEO is a she. (I think that’s a first for NPR…) And she has NO RADIO EXPERIENCE.

I’m excited.

Gawker’s posted her memo to NYTimes.com staff.

Here she is talking about doing online video for NYTimes.com:

Sounds like she’s got a lot of experience doing online news as well as long format programming for cable.

I wish her luck with NPR politics. She’s stepping into a pretty charged situation.

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If you never have, check out NYTimes video site, they have some good stuff (unfortunately it looks like you can’t embed):

http://video.nytimes.com/

The Incredible Shrinking World

“When people find themselves unable to control the world, they simply shrink the world to the size of their community” –Manuel Castells

DC may not be the best place to see this trend cause just about everybody has consistently leaned to the left, but this guy has some really interesting examples of the political polarization across the country and how it’s getting hard-coded into geography/place and even into the visual landscape.

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I feel like another piece to this is our selective media consumption and how the lack of common media outlets may reinforce this segregation trend.

Baracky Roasts Rahmbo (2005)

From 'Survivor' to 'Live Like You're Dying'

Reality TV knows no bounds…

On the one hand a dying person would get to do something they really want to do before they die.

On the other hand, millions of people will be watching, CBS would be making money off of it, and Jeff Probst, who I can’t stand, would host.

I want to be disgusted by the idea…but the more I think about it, I think I’m mostly disgusted by Jeff Probst.

Palin Around With Obscurity

I am really curious what the fallout of the election will be for Palin.

The dirt on her is coming out heavy. Even Fox made her look bad and her staffers too.

She doesn’t know what Africa is, she walks around in a towel, she likes to spend other people’s money on clothes, she was talking to a head of state without informing her running mate.

I really see her selection as a symptom of a Rovian problem…the intelligence or lack of it lies with the campaign advisors.

Candidates are just identity politics place holders with no real agendas or thoughts of their own. Those can all be uploaded.

Bush is the best and worst example.

In any event, I’m calling Palin with her own VH1 show by 2012!

For the record, this may not be much of a prediction…

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In his Globe and Mail piece, John Doyle had some interesting ideas:

What’s happening with the Palin story is what has happened over and over again on U.S. TV over the past 20 years. Ordinary, working-class people, sometimes startlingly inarticulate and with messy personal lives, are thrown into the TV spotlight and, by being ordinary – bartenders, truck drivers, hairdressers and janitors on Survivor or Big Brother – they are a good bet for being compelling on TV. The women have names such as Misty and the guys are called Ace, or similar.

Look at the Palin clan – a moose-hunting, snowmobiling couple with a bunch of kids who have soap-opera names: Track, Willow, Bristol, Piper and Trig. There’s the knocked-up teenager daughter, the gun-totin’ mom and even if it seems the teenagers are at it like rabbits, there’s the declaration of deep conservatism and the assertion – later withdrawn in a sort-of manner – that creationism should be taught alongside evolution in public schools. They’re straight out of Survivor, Big Brother, Wife Swap, Love Cruise, Temptation Island, Married by America and Are You Hot?

A few years ago, CBS gave serious consideration to a reality series called The Real Beverly Hillbillies. The idea was to “transplant genuine Appalachian natives into the world of Los Angeles glitz and glamour.” It never happened. But now it has, with a twist – Alaskan hillbillies have been transplanted into the world of Washington politics.

SNL goes geek

(Watch at Hulu)

If you wanna see some original geekage, check out this Ted Talk:

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Hulu is really stepping up their game. It’s good to see the entertainment bigwigs keeping up w/ new technologies.

TV Pundit School?

From NY Times:

Journalists once had to achieve a certain gravitas before appearing on television as a political expert, but not anymore. Thanks to the 24-hour news cycle, a riveting presidential election and the proliferation of cable channels, people like Mr. Freire, who is 26 and has been managing editor of The American Spectator, a conservative magazine, since January, are finding themselves in hot demand.

Tucker Carlson may have paved the way, becoming a host of “Crossfire” when barely over age 30. More-recent role models include Luke Russert, the 23-year-old son of the late Tim Russert, who was hired by NBC this summer to cover the youth vote, and Rachel Maddow, who is 35 and rose from nowhere to become a top-rated headliner on MSNBC.

This is no joke:

This led him to the Leadership Institute, a conservative policy group in Arlington, Va., that has given courses in punditry to nearly 600 people this year, up from 461 in 2005. The institute offers various courses, from a $75 basic lecture to a $1,500 three-hour one-on-one session. The American Spectator paid to send Mr. Freire to the most advanced class.

And so he found himself on a recent Monday in a mock studio, watching a tape of a practice interview he had just done on privatizing Social Security, with several coaches critiquing his performance.

“That was great when J. P. said, ‘The question is, can you trust government?’ ” said Ian Ivey, the communications director at the Leadership Institute. “But then you need to follow up with a sound bite that you can expect to hear on ‘Hannity’ later.” (The reference was to “Hannity & Colmes,” the popular talk show on Fox.)

More on Ashely Todd

Sullivan posted a video of the media running w/ the story of the girl claiming she was attacked by an Obama Supporter:

Turns out this girl got kicked out of the Ron Paul Camp for deceptive stunts:

In March, Ms. Todd was asked to leave a grass-roots group of Ron Paul supporters in Brazos County, Texas, group leader Dustan Costine said. He said Ms. Todd posed as a supporter of former Arkansas governor and presidential candidate Mike Huckabee and called the local Republican committee seeking information about its campaign strategies.

“She would call the opposing campaign and pretend she was on their campaign to get information,” Mr. Costine said last night. “We had to remove her because of the tactics she displayed. After that we had nothing to do with her.”

About a month earlier, he said, Ms. Todd sent an e-mail to the Ron Paul group saying her tires were slashed and that campaign paraphernalia had been stolen from her car because she supported Mr. Paul.

(via Boing Boing)

Palin on Scientific Research

Not so good: