By any measure, “The Lord of the Rings Trilogy” is an astonishing success, the stuff box-office dreams are made of. And for fans, it has fantastic creatures, stunning special effects and bold heroes caught up in an epic battle between good and evil. [More]
Month: February 2004
From: Oscars.org: The Scientific and Technical Academy Awards will be presented on February 14, 2004, at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Pasadena. Scientific and Technical Awards are given for devices, methods, formulas, discoveries or inventions of special and outstanding value to the arts and sciences of motion pictures that also have a proven history of use in the motion picture industry. To Stephen Regelous for the design and development of Massive, the autonomous agent animation system used for the battle sequences in “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy. Massive takes a new approach in simulating behaviors of large numbers of computer generated extras (a.k.a.) “agents.” Each “agent” contains a primitive software “brain” used to develop behavioral rules simulating a wide range of behaviors. In “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy,over 200,000 agents were controlled in several scenes.
BBC News Online assesses what impact Sunday’s Baftas may have on Oscar voting in two weeks’ time. When the prestigious best film Bafta is handed out in London on Sunday evening, US Academy members will be watching with their usual interest. But to what degree, if any, will the choice have an impact on their own decision two weeks later? [More]
Carissa writes: In the February 23rd issue of People Magazine on page 31 with Drew Barrymore on the cover, there is a short interview with Fran Walsh and Annie Lennox called Sound Off. They talk about the inspiration for the song, working together, and why audiences connect to the saga.
Anyone with a scanner, send it along!
Here are your questions answered by Lord of the Rings star Billy Boyd. Jordan Stewart, Birmingham: “Was Pippin the only character you auditioned for and which other character would you have liked to play instead?” [More]
If you’ve ever watched the Oscars at home (or while stuffing your face with party food as I’ve done the past two years) you can remember a small, rather dull segment where they mention ‘scientific & technical awards given our earlier in the month’. Well today is that day, and it is certainly NOT going to be dull for the creators of MASSIVE, the computer technology that helped create hundreds of thousands of little tiny men in LOTR. The team behind MASSIVE is up for an award or two tonight at an dinner presented at The Ritz-Carlton Huntington Hotel in Pasadena. Good luck! [More]