Oscar goes to Maya — a 3-D graphics software

By Mike Snider
USA Today

The three blockbusters nominated for Oscars for visual effects had more in common than their nominations: All used the same 3-D graphics software to pull off much of their movie magic. And that program has won an Academy Award of its own.

Software developer Alias/Wavefront was given a special-merit Oscar at the technical awards ceremony in early March for Maya, a 3-D animation program. With the award, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has signaled that computer graphics are as integral to Hollywood as motion-picture cameras, color film, projection systems and cinema sound.

This year's three visual-effects nominees, "Spider-Man," "Star Wars, Episode II: Attack of the Clones" and "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers," are just a few films that have relied on Maya to bring otherwise unattainable stunts and scenes to the screen. Among the others are the visual-effects winners of the past four years — "The Lord of the Rings: The

Fellowship of the Ring," "Gladiator," "The Matrix" and "What Dreams May Come" — as well as upcoming blockbusters "The Matrix Reloaded," "The Hulk" and "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines."

Maya allows animators to fashion wire-frame stick figures and flesh them out into realistic, moving 3-D characters that can seamlessly interact with — or stand in for — human actors. "Maya is probably the biggest standard in the industry," said Jim Rygiel, visual effects supervisor for "The Two Towers."

In creating the world of Middle-earth, the New Zealand effects house Weta Digital had endless uses for the software, including the animation of Gollum, the walking-talking tree creatures called ents and giant mastodon-like oliphaunts.

Over the past 75 years, the academy has given only 40 award-of-merit statuettes. This is the second awarded for software. (Pixar earned one in 2000.)

The academy praised Alias/Wavefront for Maya's enhancement of the computer-graphics creative process and its ease of customization. In "Spider-Man," Sony Pictures Imageworks used Maya for everything from creating a three-dimensional computer-generated model of the webhead — animated with realistic motion, lifelike clothing, textures, lighting and shading — to digitally inserting him into movie scenes.

In "Spider-Man," the filmmakers actually "fool the eye," said Alias/Wavefront President Doug Walker, by switching between a computer-generated Spider-Man and a costumed Tobey Maguire or stuntman. "None of us can tell which is real."