(92 Short Features - 5 ½ hours of continuous viewing)

• Electronic Theater (DVD Issue 156)
• Animation Theater I (DVD Issue 157)
• Animation Theater II (DVD Issue 158)

The SIGGRAPH 2007 Video Reviews are a select subset of the international ACM SIGGRAPH 2007 Electronic Theater and Animation Festival. The work represents some of the world’s most innovative, accomplished, and amazing digital art from around the world, featuring award-winning achievements in time-based art, scientific visualization, visual effects, real-time graphics, and narrative shorts.

The purpose is to:

• Expand awareness of people and nature;
• Illuminate the role digital media play in shaping, extending, and reflecting worldviews and cosmologies;
• Explore ecological, social, and political issues in imaginative and mind-bending ways;
• Foster respect, tolerance and empathy among people and nations.

The SIGGRAPH 2007 Electronic Theater and Animation Festival weaves amazing visual imagery from numerous disciplines into a singular mind-altering event. Just as computer graphics blurs the line between real and virtual, each of these films in its unique way explores what is tangible and what is imaginary and whether that difference is important. With show categories ranging from animation to research, the submissions originated from countries across the globe including France, Germany, Japan, Poland, South Korea, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and New Zealand. For the first time in the history of SIGGRAPH, two of the award-winning films were student entries. Groundbreaking work in computer visualization technology presented by ACM SIGGRAPH has amazed audiences around the world for three decades.

More about the ACM SIGGRAPH Computer Animation and Electronic Theater Festival Program 2007

Since 1999, the SIGGRAPH Computer Animation Festival has also been an official qualifying festival for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences “Best Animated Short Film” award.

For the first time in the history of SIGGRAPH, two of the award-winning films were student entries. SIGGRAPH 2007 also marks the first time filmmakers were able to submit high definition video to the selection jury, which greatly increased the jury’s ability to appreciate the intricacy of each film – especially the award winners.

“This year’s winners are perfect examples of how computer graphics is enabling small, independent groups to create films with vast landscapes, complex characters, and amazing visuals,” commented Debevec Paul Debevec (SIGGRAPH 2007 Computer Animation Festival Chair from the University of Southern California’s Institute for Creative Technologies) (SIGGRAPH 2007 Animation Committee).

Debevic continues, “The winning films are not cartoons where scissors dance with staplers, but films with credible human characters who find love, suffer loss, and face their mortality, leaving a profound emotional impact on the audience.”