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FilmSkool — a free film school

Introduction to subdivision surfaces | Character modeling | Computer animation | Khan Academy

Pixar engineers explain subdivision surfaces, the algorithm that turns a low-poly cage into the smooth, huggable characters audiences expect from a Pixar film. Best for viewers curious about the tech under the art.

Khan Academy Labs · 6 min · Intermediate · ANI · Animation · 2015

What you take away

Smooth CG surfaces are built by mathematically averaging a rough polygon cage.

Watch it

Filed under

Oscar winners for visual effects

Oscar winners for animated feature

Big Hero 6 (2014)
Toy Story 3 (2010)
Up (2009)
WALL·E (2008)
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)

Books on animation

The workstation

Western Digital WD_BLACK SN850X 4TB — The other one, usually cheaper
Calibrite Display Pro HL — Calibrates the monitor you are trusting
SanDisk Professional G-DRIVE 8TB — Desktop archive drive built for footage
Corsair 128GB DDR5 kit — For Unreal, caches and twelve open applications
Dell UltraSharp U2723QE — The sensible 4K second monitor
Intel Core Ultra 9 285K — Quick Sync, which some codecs still love

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