I Got to Meet James Cameron

I just returned from Anaheim, where I was covering the SolidWorks World conference, an event very similar to Autodesk University. I always enjoy attending this event and am grateful that the folks at SolidWorks invited me. The enthusiasm of the SolidWorks user community is amazing. Even with the slow economy, there were 5,000 people in attendance.

One of the high-points for me was a presentation on Tuesday morning by director James Cameron, this on the same morning that the Academy Award nominations were announced. After his keynote, Cameron met with members of the press and answered questions for more than 30 minutes. I was able to ask the second question, which elicited about a 5 minute response. Afterwards, Cameron met individually with most of the press in attendance, shook hands, posed for photos, and answered additional questions.

Needless to say, it was a real thrill.

Of course, I've also got things to report on the conference itself, but I'll save that for a subsequent posting.

A Monsterous Time in LA

This week I'm in Los Angeles attending a press event. I can't tell you the details of the event until Monday. What I can tell you at present is that I'm staying at the beautiful Beverly Wilshire Hotel.


The hotel is at the corner of Wilshire Boulevard and Rodeo Drive and was featured in the movie "Pretty Woman."

On Thursday evening, I had the rare opportunity to visit DreamWorks Studios, where I got to meet with several of the people behind the studio's new animated feature "Monsters vs. Aliens."



"Monsters vs. Aliens" required more than 40 million computing hours to make - more than eight times as many as the original "Shrek" and nearly double what it took to create "Kung Fu Panda."



I got to see the film last night in 3D in a phenomenal theater on the DreamWorks lot. The film opened today on 7,000 screens in North America. But only 2,000 of those screens are equipped with the nearly $100,000 in equipment needed to show the film in 3D ($75,000 to convert to digital projection plus $25,000 more for the RealD system used by approximately 90% of the 3D-capable theaters in the U.S.).

Starting with this film, DreamWorks will make all of its movies natively in 3D. Technology from HP powered the tremendous computing power needed to render the movie. "Monsters vs. Aliens" required nearly 100 terabytes of disk storage and would have taken more than 1,000 years to render on a single workstation.



I thoroughly enjoyed the film, although in terms of movies, it was not in the same class as several of the Pixar features, such as "Wall-E", "Finding Nemo", or "The Incredibles". "Monsters vs. Aliens" came across more as a collection of scenes with some good jokes. Still very entertaining, but not one of those films destined to end up on a must-see list. Except for the 3D. If you're going to see this movie, definitely seek out one of those 2,000 theaters showing it in 3D.

Movie Review: Man on Wire

Maybe it's the writer in me. Or the fact that I watch a lot of movies. But for whatever reason, I felt compelled to write a movie review. At least the movie in question has some link to the other themes of this blog.

To simply say that Man on Wire tells the story of French high-wire walker Philippe Petit's stroll between the towers of the World Trade Center misses the point completely. Most New Yorkers know that on the morning of August 7, 1974, Petit not only walked a wire strung between the roofs of the two towers, he spent nearly an hour walking back and forth, even laying down on the wire at one point and saluting the police waiting to take him into custody. The film's title is a reference to the charges filed against Petit, (tresspassing, disturbing the peace, "man on wire"), which were later dismissed in exchange for him putting on slightly more sedate, free performance for the children of New York.

I even remember where I was that day (although it's not an event so etched in my memory that I remember what I was doing, or anything like that). But that was quite a summer. I was taking summer classes at Syracuse University School of Architecture. A few weeks later, Richard Nixon resigned.

Nor can you just say that Man on Wire is a documentary. Because in spite of the fact that we know what's going to happen, British filmmaker James Marsh delivers a pulse-pounding story that's more like a thriller than many supposed thrillers I've watched recently. It helps that the young Petit had the foresight to film much of the preparation for his feat. Of course, there was also news footage of those preparations, like the time he secretly rigged a wire and then walked between the towers of Notre Dame Catherdral in Paris. He later performed a similar feat between two towers of the Harbour Bridge in Sydney, Australia.

The film integrates Petit's "home movies" with stylized re-enactments and interviews with many of the participants as the director documents every step Petit and his team took to circumvent both the security at the nearly completed World Trade Center and the physics of smuggling nearly a ton of stainless steel cable and rigging into the towers and then figuring out how to string it between them.

Thirty-five years later, and with the twin towers gone, the feat, and this film, remain absolutely mind-blowing. When I brought the DVD out to watch the other night, my daughter initially wanted no part. But inertia prevented her from leaving the room and minutes into the film, she was hooked. We even ended up watching all the special features. I think you will as well.