Getting Animated at SIGGRAPH

This week, Ocarina sent a contingent to SIGGRAPH 2009, a conference and exhibition that draws computer graphics, animation, post-production, and imaging specialists from around the globe. Lots of toys to look at, and stories to hear. We are there through the end of this week, spending time in the booths of two of our partners, Isilon Systems and BlueArc. We’re so tired we almost feel like we’re getting wall-eyed, but every time we look up we see more folks who have gotten in their cars and driven here. There are so many new talents here, it’s really a group of incredibles. As far we can tell, the blue sky is the limit to what they can achieve.

If we were ever wondering whether next-generation data reduction technologies are needed in this era of animated, 3-D movies, the stories we’re hearing at this show convinced us that without some type of data reduction we could heading for an ice age. Data growth for this industry is a clear and present danger.

This has been a great week already for BlueArc, which announced that Starz Animation used its storage for a new animated feature, “9″ from Focus Features. For those who are here, we encourage you to come tomorrow, as cinematographer John Hickson, IT Systems Architect at Starz, and the champion of the Studio Sys Admins user group is going to speak in the booth about the installation and the movie itself. *Thanks Julie Herd Goodman for that correction.*

One of the Starz folks, Terry Dale, is quoted in the news release as follows:

“During the production of Focus’ 9, it was critical that we have a storage system in place that would handle the massive demands of the three films we were animating concurrently. 9, in particular, has characters — specifically the machines and the seamstress — that generate enormous data sets during rendering,” said Terry Dale, VP, operations, for Starz Animation Toronto. “The BlueArc Titan storage system gave us the performance we needed, the reliability we required and enabled us to complete our production on 9 without disruption.”

And in case you haven’t seen it, here is the preview for this amazing looking Tim Burton extravaganza: