I support everything Pixar—well, everything other than Cars that is. So this early, early footage of a 3D hand from 1972, which was made by Ed Catmull, Pixar co-founder, and Fred Parke, is just so, so awesome.

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As much as we hate 3D around these parts, you can't deny that this is so wicked cool. NINETEEN SEVENTY TWO, people. Plus, we love Pixar more than we hate 3D. Here's a bit of background on the video:

The best part of this film is not even the 3D rendering itself, but the outtakes and "making of" footage that has been interwoven throughout, including footage of a plaster replica of Ed's hand onto which he is meticulously mapping the polygon vertices that make up the three dimensional model (around 1:30). That's really remarkable. The math that we take for granted for rendering 3D was being invented, real time, to create this video.

Read the full account at nerdplusart. [nerdplusart]