The Story of Computer Graphics

Part informative history and part industrial film, this documentary presents a useful overview of the technology that is rapidly overtaking the world of mainstream visual entertainment. The film begins by laying out the Cold War-inspired political and military motivations behind the technology race and development of computers. For an audience unacquainted with the origins of the computer revolution, this early material, which is illustrated by archive footage as well as many original computer-spawned images, proves fascinating. Nearly all pioneers of the movement who appear on-camera are mild-mannered, articulate middle-aged men, but archival footage reveals them almost uniformly to have once been freaks, geeks and misfits of the first order.