IGN Exclusive Interview: Andrew Stanton

The director of Finding Nemo and the forthcoming Wall-E talks about his latest cinematic creation.

IGN: How much of the voice cast in Wall-E was driven by Ben Burtt, the sound designer, as opposed to recruiting familiar names and faces?

Stanton: I think if you look back at the last couple of movies we don't go for names just for names' sake. It's pretty random if we happen to catch somebody that's on the up; even Tom Hanks and Tim Allen weren't as big in '92 as how they became by '95 -- even that was chance. So we just found that the only way to guarantee that the movie was going to be good was that you get the best voice cast for that character, so that when you watch them you're not going, "Oh, that's Jim Carrey." You want to go that's the character. It's great if it's somebody famous and can help the marketing of the movie, but that's never going to drive why we choose the talent.



[read the full interview]

JazzMutant @ Siggraph Emerging Technologies 2007

Digital innovations that change the way we work, live, and play.

Emerging Technologies presents creative, innovative technologies and applications in many fields, including but not limited to: displays, robotics, input devices, interaction techniques, computer vision, sensors, audio, speech, biometrics, wearable computing, information, data and scientific visualization, biotechnology, graphics, collaborative environments, and design.

And in several domains, including but not limited to: medicine, music, entertainment, education, home, business, aerospace, communication, transportation, security, military, and technologies for the aging and/or disabled.

[Emerging Technologies Video Preview - Windows Media, 10.2 MB]

Jazzmutant is proud to have been selected by the Siggraph Emerging Technologies Committee in San Diego to demo a new prototype device for digital imaging involving multi-touch control. This solution will go beyond mere finger-drawing and clearly illustrate a new way to interact and improve productivity with drawing and video editing software. Furthermore, the solution presented will be the very first multi-touch enabled Tablet PC shown to the public.

New Multi-Touch Interaction Techniques for Visual Content Creation

The latest development of JazzMutant's multi-touch technology with a particular focus on visual and graphic arts, and some new advanced interaction techniques involving a multi-touch display in combination with other input devices.

Enhanced Life
Because of their versatility, multi-touch displays are appropriate for both productive and entertaining computing. By providing ergonomic design with optimized workflow, they improve user experience and make interaction with computers much more intuitive, playful, and efficient.

Goals
JazzMutant delivers advanced control solutions for musicians and sound engineers, but video and graphic artists have requested similar systems for their applications. This system demonstrates early attempts to fulfill those requests.

Innovations
The JazzMutant resistive technologysystem differs from optical systems in its form factor. Because it is both scalable and portable, it can be integrated in a wide variety of devices. It is exceptionally reliable, even in harsh environments. And it can be used in conjunction with other pointing devices such as stylus. This enables richer interaction techniques that can not be achieved with touch input alone.

Vision
In the past two years, many good multi-touch interaction techniques have been introduced, but most of them are merely focused on zoomable user interfaces. This approach is only the tip of the iceberg. The key to success for future multi-touch systems is multi-modality: appropriate integration of several input devices.

[via createdigitalmusic.com]
[siggraph.org]

Ryōan-ji: The Temple of the Peaceful Dragon

"After a visit to Japan with David Tudor in 1962, John Cage became fascinated by Soami's 15th century Zen dry garden at Ryoanji, in Kyoto. The emptiness of the sand, the placement of the stones, and the illusion created by the five islands of 15 stones, rising out of moss within an ocean of white sand, seemed to confirm certain of his ideas about music. In 1983 he began to produce exquisite graphic works entitled Where R = Ryoanji, using stones, pencils and the chance methods of the I Ching. At the same time, he composed pieces for a variety of solo instruments, also entitled Ryoanji." [David Toop]



[Ryoanji official website]