Mind Melting. Roadtrip Overload.

Spent the last few evenings glued to the screen, bouncing from hotel to hotel, trying to find the right fit between price and location for our stays in LA, SF and Vegas. Maybe I’m picky, but that stuff is draining. I don’t know what I’d do without Trip Advisor to be honest.

Originally we had planned to stay wherever, but as our plans started crystalizing, we decided for peace of mind, to book places while in the cities, rather than trying to find something in the stress of it all.

So now we’ve got the car ready, hopefully a true all-American Mustang V6 convertible, what other way is there to roadtrip the US? We’ve got hotels in the major cities, we’ve got our 4000+km route. We’re going to see Pixar and Skywalker Ranch! I’m meeting up with various people, including the venerable Michael Rubin, and we’re going to see both John Williams and AC/DC while in LA.

Holy crap.

Oh, and I’m still hoping for some NIN tickets for LA on the 7th, though that’s looking remote, to put it mildly. I might be able to convince Rikke that we go down to the venue on the night and see if we can pick up some tickets; it being the last concert of the tour (and supposedly for a long while), it would be epic.

And once we get home? Well, someone has to figure out how to convince our bank how we could possible be considered responsible and grown with spending habits like the ones we’re about to display. I honestly have no clue about that one. But this is once-in-a-lifetime stuff, and as such, irresponsibility is part and parcel.

The worst part? Three weeks doesn’t look like a whole lot anymore.

Vol Libre

It’s an exciting time to be a Pixar/Lucasfilm nerd, to be sure. Michael Rubin let me know—and posted about—that Loren Carpenter, co-founder of Pixar, put a copy Vol Libre, his 1980 CG fractal mountain short, online for our viewing pleasure. And it’s quite something.

Vol Libre from Loren Carpenter on Vimeo

The audience erupted. The entire hall was off their feet and hollering. They wanted to see it again. “They had never seen anything like it,” recalled Ed Catmull. Loren was beaming.
“There was a strategy in this,” said Loren, “because I new Ed and Alvy were going to be in the front row of the room when I was giving the talk.” Everyone at Siggraph knew about Ed and Alvy and the aggregation at Lucasfilm. They were already rock stars Ed and Alvy walked up to Loren Carpenter after the film and asked if he could start in October.
- Page 77, Droidmaker.

Though it’s only related to Loren Carpenter and not so much Vol Libre, Chapter 2 of Out of Control by Kevin Kelly has a very interesting mass-experiment by Loren Carpenter which is worth reading as well. And incidentally, this coincides with the release of the, as usual, wonderful trailer for Toy Story 1 and 2 in 3D.

Download Droidmaker for Free!

Woke up to this scoop:

Hi Michael,
Thought you might want the first notice – because of your posting, i’ve received a fair amount of email, and i’ve decided to post my book for FREE on my blog...

Its more important to me that the story of Lucasfilm be shared and circulated than for me to profit directly. So if you wanted to add that to your blog – you’d be the first!

Thanks for your kind words and support.

Michael (Rubin)

I don’t know what you’re still doing here, when you should be over there, downloading the hell out of that thing! It’s gorgeous; the full 518-page book, complete with photosRare photos I might add, plugged in many cases straight out of the Lucasfilm vault or even personal collections from the people who were there., index and whatever else you’ll find in the printed version, covering everything from Lucas’ earliest years up through the creation of ILM and its struggle to put Star Wars up on the silver screen, down through Coppola’s experiements with mobile film making, the creation of Pixar, non-linear editing, digital sound editing, the creation of the Games Group and much much more. It is in actual fact, a book about the creation of modern filmmaking (and to some extent games even) as we know it. Don’t let the technical foundation scare you off though; it’s not only accessible, but centered on the people, not the tech. It was easily one of the most enjoyable reads I’ve had in years.

As he does, I obviously suggest you just go ahead and buy the real thing, should you like what you see.

PS: In case you missed it yesterday, Michael Rubin appeared on Pirillo back when he was promoting the book. There’s also an interview up over at Unidentified Sound Object.

Update: Downloads have passed 10.000, and Michael has posted a breakdown of where the traffic has come from so far. There’s also a FAQ.

The Human Story of Pixar

Michael Rubin, author of Droidmaker (a fantastic look at what is essentially the genesis of modern Hollywood) reposted the ’71 Lucas interview from last week, which reminded me of The Human Story of Pixar, a celebratory panel from 2005, in which Rubin interviews Brad Bird, Andrew Stanton, Alvy Ray Smith, Ed Catmull, some of the great minds behind Pixar and just about ever single technology that make 3D graphics as we know it, possible.

You may already have seen it, but even so, and especially if you haven’t, it is a truly inspiring hour and forty.

For following up, I suggest Droidmaker of course, this interview with Rubin on the subject of Droidmaker (though I don’t normally care for Pirillo and the on-going chat on that video shows exactly when the social web has been taken too far) as well as The Pixar Touch and The Second Coming of Steve Jobs.

Update: Since this entry went up, Michael Rubin has put up Droidmaker for free download!