A Pixar Tribute: A Blu-ray Miscompute

Two evenings ago, I treated myself to an audio-visual delight; Pixar’s Short Films Collection: Vol. 1 on Blu-ray (also available on DVD) via Netflix, excerpts of which you can view on the company’s website (and which you can find online for purchase via iTunes, or alternatively via…ahem…Google or other sources). Spanning the years 1984 (The Adventures of André & Wally B.) to 2006 (Lifted), Short Films Collection: Vol. 1 provides a fascinating chronology of the development of the computer industry, whose hardware and software provided the development and rendering foundation for all of the content on the disc. Sequentially viewing one chronologically-ordered clip after another, the exponentially evolving capabilities that the technology treadmill has afforded Pixar were exceedingly evident to me, with respect to factors such as:

• The amount of detail afforded to each 3D static and animated model in a scene notably the increasingly-accurate water behaviour
• The number of 3D static and (particularly) animated models per scene
• Objects’ interactions with each other and with themselves, via characteristics such as reflections, shadows (and self-shadowing), and physics actions (and reactions)
• Atmospheric effects, and their realism, such as lighting, smoke, fog, etc., and
• The increasing runtime of each clip

If you rent or buy the disc, make sure you also watch the included ‘making of’ documentary, which will undoubtedly give you an appreciation for the archaic (by modern standards) algorithms, code and equipment that Pixar worked with (and around) in developing much of the material. For example, I thought the baby (and his immovable lump-o-diaper) in Tin Toy was hideous…until the interviews with the developers gave me a 1988-technology reality check! Many of the clips were already familiar to me from the ‘extras’ sections of Pixar-created DVD movies I’ve watched, and from past SIGGRAPH conferences. And Blu-ray’s high definition video capability, coupled with my Sony PlayStation 3 and HDTV, rendered them to full effect, with added detail especially noticeable beginning with 1989’s Knick Knack.

But…for a while, I thought I wasn’t going to be able to watch the disc at all. As is (unfortunately) quite common nowadays, it began with promotional clips and previews. When I attempted to skip them by hitting the remote control’s Top Menu button, I got the inevitable three screens’ worth of do-not-copy copyright information…followed by a perpetual blank screen. The PS3 thankfully still responded to ‘disc eject’ and ‘power off’ requests, but otherwise was locked up; even after removing the disc, I got no sound or display until I power-cycled the unit. I tried this same sequence three times, with the exact same behaviour; the disc had no obvious mars and in fact looked brand new.

Thank goodness for the passionate folks at AVS Forum; via its search engine, I discovered that this is a known glitch, which you can dodge by fast-forwarding through the previews (thank goodness for 120x realtime mode!) instead of bypassing them. Granted, playback glitches aren’t restricted to Blu-ray (although this isn’t the first time I’ve heard of them); three months back, for example, I reported on a glitch with Heroes on HD DVD. However, I’m particularly surprised to encounter them on the PS3, considering its hardware capability potential and easily updateable (and frequently upgraded) firmware, both of which are factors in my past recommendation of it to Blu-ray backers among you. Considering that the disc was just released on Blu-ray on November 6, perhaps I should be more forgiving. Regardless, I hope Sony fixes the issue soon, so that you can enjoy the material in an error-free fashion.

p.s…make sure you take the time to read through the credits at the end of each clip. Some of them are pretty hilarious!