ANIMATION WORLD MAGAZINE April 1996 Creating the Memories by Bill Kroyer This article is adapted from the I Really Feel Sorry For You Kid… keynote address Bill Kroyer gave at I finally ended up at Disney in the Ojai Animation Conference, in 1977, which was an interesting Ojai, California, on July 22, 1995.The place to be then. It was the link to Conference, designed as a retreat for the Golden Age. You are probably the animation industry, was hearing about how we are going sponsored by the International into the second Golden Age, which Animated Film Society, ASIFA- I think might be true. Yet, in those Hollywood, in association with the days everybody sat around and Ojai Film Society.When Kroyer gave moped, feeling bad about the fact the talk, he had recently started that they missed it. working as co-director on Warner We used to have guest artists Bros. Feature Animation's first film, come over who would say, “I really now entitled The Quest for feel sorry for you kid, you missed the Camelot, which is being co-produced Bill and Sue Kroyer Golden Age. Your life is worthless. by his wife, Sue Kroyer. Why bother ? You weren't there !” Some of the Nine Old Men were If you asked them still there in 1977, including Frank why they were not Thomas, Ollie Johnson, Willie oday, animation is exploding. innovating, they'd say, Reitherman and Eric Larson. But the And with billion dollar “Because we do studio was still stuck in a time warp, Tanimated films, direct-to-video what we do best,” technically and creatively. If you and CD-ROMs, there are big profi- which meant they just asked them why they were not ts to be made. That's OK, after all, didn't dare touch innovating, they'd say, “Because we it is an art-industry. People forget the formula that do what we do best,” which meant the hyphen, but you need money Walt had left behind. they just didn't dare touch the to do this art form. formula that Walt had left behind. What I would like to discuss, If you were an artist who had though, is not so much the I came out to L.A. in 1975 and been transported from Disney in business of animation, but what it immediately went to Disney to get 1941 to 1977, there wouldn't be a means to be an artist and a job. They wouldn't take me, whole heck of a lot of technology animation as an art form. I'm going because I didn't have an art school that you would not instantly know do this from my own perspective, portfolio. Instead, I got a job in a about. You knew about peg bars, looking back on my career and small commercial studio, where my reinforcements, pencil tests and the what I've experienced. first assignment was erasing the multiplane camera. You might Back in the 1960s, it was said stretch lines off of Mr. Clean's pants, discover Xerox machines and reel- that President Nixon was asked because he looked too virile. My to-reel pencil test machines ; but why he didn't think there was a second assignment was to put beyond that nothing had really recession. He said, “Well I have a pants on elves, because they only changed. job, and all my friends are work- had shirts on and somebody finally In the 1970s, the industry was ing.” Well, I'm happy to say that, realized they were naked. That is in a real slump. Disney was the all my friends are working now. It when I learned the two most only studio making realistic wasn't always like that ; but now important principles of animation : features, and even their films had they are and that's part of what's It will go by so fast that you'll never reached bottom. Then some great about the animation see it ; and if you can't make it milestones came up and things industry today. good, make it loud and fast. started to change. 5 ANIMATION WORLD MAGAZINE April 1996 And Along Came Tron Crusades. Suddenly, I realized we were Inner-Penetrating Objects and Many people see Who Framed seeing this little tiny tip of an iceberg Fractal Walls Roger Rabbit as the big milestone. of what had been going on for years. It was great. If we wanted to That's the one that made the Tron was the beginning. It was do an effect, we'd tell these guys, money. Yes, but there was another the moment when computer “Invent it.” They had no software that may have been even more graphics made its first contact with for it, so they would sit down and prophetic : Tron, made by Disney the animation industry — like the write it. back in 1982. sperm and the egg. Then they would say, “We wrote some software that does this. So, we would make up something in the story to use it. For instance, they were so ashamed when they showed us inner-penetrating objects. But we thought that was pretty cool and we actually made up a neat character composed of inner- penetrating objects. On the other hand, I once gave David Warner as the villainous Sark in Tron © 1982 Walt Disney Productions an assignment to do a scene where a ship flies out of a hanger. Every guy in the United States of America After waiting eight weeks, I asked, that was into computer graphics showed up to work on it. “Where's the scene ?” They said, It was like the Crusades. “Oh man, you're going to be so thrilled. We built a fractal wall.” I asked, “What's a fractal wall ?” I had left Disney earlier because I It was neat, because nobody had didn't want to work on The Black ever done it before. There were no The idea is to do things that Cauldron. I happened to land in the experts around. So, I inherited the are cheap lap of Steve Lisberger, who was position of Director of Animation. and look good, making Animalympics. Mind you, this Luckily, I caught on to it pretty well. not things that are was not the world's greatest film, It is incredible when you look at expensive which although it was a feature film that the people who worked on Tron, nobody notices. was completely hand ink-and- who are now key players at places That's a cardinal painted by nine people in a ware- like Pixar, Rhythm & Hues, PDI and rule of filmmaking. house in Venice, which is pretty Digital Domain. All these young guys amazing. After Animalympics, we couldn't believe somebody was really developed Tron and took it to Disney. going to hire them to do this type Well, it was this thing that looked Tron became a revolutionary thing. of work. like a rock wall, the kind of thing a When we first starting working on it, background painter could have we didn't know how we would do it. done in about six hours. They It was just an idea about a guy and a worked eight weeks on it and only computer. But when we showed up they would know it's a fractal wall. at Disney, something started That's a problem you always happening ; it was almost like putting have. The idea is to do things that a blue light on the back porch and are cheap and look good, not having flies from all over the things that are expensive which neighborhood come to it. Every guy nobody notices. To me, that's a in the United States of America that cardinal rule of filmmaking. was into computer graphics showed Jeff Bridges is an electronic warrior in Tron. Tron was an unusual picture. It's up to work on it. It was like the © 1982 Walt Disney Productions where all this technology came 6 ANIMATION WORLD MAGAZINE April 1996 together and started to be utilized. such a high level of performance, underneath it, like the wrist and Looking back now, it was that it was actually designed to fingers, will follow. It sounds trivial somewhat primitive, but it was crash three or four times a day. now, yet back then people were weird mix of human effort and And the only people who could just starting write this type of technology. start it back up again were people software. If you watch the credits, you'll from Cray. So, when you bought The first time I animated a see a couple hundred Chinese a Cray, they sent people who human figure using this software, characters at the end : those are would live with it, called Crayons, I did a dancing cycle. Some people the names of the artists who in a trailer in the parking lot. looked at it and said, “Wow, how painted mattes in Taiwan. A year The Cray was so fast that none did you do that ?” But one of the later, that was totally obsolete. of us could actually “speak” to it. programmers said, “That's just key Computers could do all that. That's We first had to speak to VAX frame software.” They usually think how fast it changed. computers, which then built up that way. They hate to think that it The movie had story problems enough information until they felt takes a skill that can't be canned. and was not a big hit.