One of the First Computer-Generated Films, from 1963 - AT&T Archives

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This film was a specific project to define how a particular type of satellite would move through space. Edward E. Zajac made, and narrated, the film, which is considered to be possibly the very first computer graphics film ever. Zajac programmed the calculations in FORTRAN, then used a program written by Zajac's colleague, Frank Sinden, called ORBIT. The original computations were fed into the computer via punch cards, then the output was printed onto microfilm using the General Dynamics Electronics Stromberg-Carlson 4020 microfilm recorder. All computer processing was done on an IBM 7090 or 7094 series computer.
Zajac didn't make the film to demonstrate computer graphics, however. Instead, he was interested in real-time modeling of a certain theoretical construct. At the time, The Bell System was still deeply engaged in satellite research, having launched Telstar the previous year, with plans to continue developing communications satellites. Zajac's model is of a box ("satellite"), with two gyroscopes within. In the film, he was trying to create a simulation of movement - the pitch, roll, and yaw within that system. He gives these particulars in an article in the Bell System Technical Journal, from 1964.
Zajac worked at Bell Labs from 1954 to 1983. He passed away in 2011; his last appointment was as part of the Economics faculty at the University of Arizona. For the latter part of his career, he specialized in the economics of communications and telecommunications.
Footage Courtesy of AT&T Archives and History Center, Warren, NJ

[@oldtwinsna8347]

This was done on an IBM 7094 mainframe. It had 150K of memory and ran at 0.5MHz. The Commodore 64 that came out to the home market for $299 twenty years later was significantly more powerful. Today, the microcontroller in your mouse has more computational power than the 7094 did!

[@manuell3505]

I have a $10 Logitech. Can it load/run something via USB or it's optical analogue input?

[@MagicAndReason]

The transistor is basically as close to a "divine" miracle as man has ever achieved.

[@jsncrso]

@@manuell3505 no you can't program it

[@theannoyedmrfloyd3998]

Comparing an IBM 7094 to a Commodore 64 is an insult to the IBM.

[@ArumesYT]

The C64 ran at twice the speed, but don't forget the 36 bit vs 8 bit. I doubt if the C64 really was "significantly more powerful".

[@megabojan1993]

60 fps in the year 1963 WOW

[@johnrickard8512]

MegaBojan1993 trouble is it required a supercomputer in those days to pull it off(truth be told, supercomputers were the only computers of the day...they were all as big as a small house)

[@oldtwinsna8347]

It was not real time. Frame by frame recompilation.

[@yasirsaheed]

Just a looping GIF 😂

[@GroovyDominoes]

and there was a high fps slow mo camera in 1930 i think it was 120 fps im not really sure but it looks like it

[@GroovyDominoes]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/fYjCkHqwoNBnfZIm53s

[@te0nani]

Michael Bay: "Needs more explosions."

[@wombleofwimbledon5442]

Or lens flares.

[@kennarajora6532]

scriptwriter should have been M night Shyamalan.

[@IThinkYouLookLarvely]

This looks incredible. Though I have just watched The Mummy Returns.

[@whereami8224]

I was curious, so I looked into it: The 7090 was a transistorized version of the 709, and probably "only" took up the space of a large room.

[@oldtwinsna8347]

Only the tape drives and punch card reader, as well as the output printers, took up most of the space. The actual main "frame" was about the size of two refrigerators. That's how the word "mainframe" came about by the way, the actual computing module vs all the i/o devices.

[@willbill808]

Reminds me of the attack plans of the Rebels in Star Wars Episode 4.

[@charlesroberts3650]

yup

[@gochem3013]

The 60s predicted the 70s. 👀

[@u.v.s.5583]

It is not a box. It is a space station.

[@Cr4z3d]

Reminds me of the Death Star briefing in the original Star Wars.

[@Hugimon2]

Behold, the power of 10 1963 Supercomputers!

[@sadalite]

AT&T was creating this in 1963, fast forward 60 years and my cell phone from them can't get a signal. Progress.

[@kezadrone]

Your video machine has more tech in it that the stuff used to land folk on the Moon. This is pretty impressive for 1963 though.

[@shasta4501]

+Sten43 Since 1977 That's because it was the size of a 2-car garage. You couldn't fit it onto a rocket.

[@meatlast]

What video machine? Betamax?

[@AlexSerenylan]

That globe still looks pretty decent for only having 2 longitudinal lines back in the day

[@theamigashow9506]

Fascinating image, thanks!

[@RADRICH199X]

I'm surprised at how smooth the satellite's rotation and orbit is, I guess it's because they had to manually calculate the animation? Even today there are a lot of modern made animations that forget to ease the movement of an object or camera, causing abrupt changes in direction or velocity.

[@aparecidacarolinacorreiada6696]

Fascinating

[@ChickenSkit]

graphics looks sick

[@ramade9040]

Ikr

[@justinnamuco9096]

That's even before the GUI right?

[@facopse]

I wonder how long it took to render

[@youreale]

no lags?

[@NickXenol]

youreale morrissey

[@rlindstrom3]

That’s amazing!

[@YourTubeVideoss]

The YEAR i Was BORN ( Feb ' 63 ) NOW im a Computer JUNKIE .. who Knew

[@kellymountain]

Wow!

[@mokmok8080]

Thanks for this vid!

[@ramade9040]

Ok

[@Rickyrab]

Nice smart alecky description of tidal locking.

[@Agarwaen]

that's not what this is

[@witnessthis4558]

If I credit you could I please use this in a short fashion film as a background?

[@saikatbose1574]

A Two Gyro Gravity Gradient attitude control System

[@Knightimex]

I bet the pc to pull this off was the size of the at&t building it's self.

[@avzarathustra6164]

Awesome!

[@seekertosecrets]

Sweet Mercy!

[@Cosmalano]

Where's the rest of it?

[@ArtMaknev]

Better than watching twilight!

[@kathrynpati]

The computer that made this clip was as big as your lounge room.

[@johneygd]

This video market the beginning of 3D graphics.

[@gertjanvandermeij4265]

wooooooooh ! its really brutal man !

[@sub-shrub7456]

dope

[@TheRosemontag]

By my calculations the object is orbiting the earth every 1 hour, or every 60 minutes, or 3600.00 seconds.

[@TheRosemontag]

When ever this satellite goes over the north pole it counts a new hour, but by the time it reaches the south pole it ticks to 30 minutes. "equal every 6 hours," depending the speed, size, and how close it is to that planet.

[@IThinkYouLookLarvely]

It's difficult for me to read these comments without hearing the voice of Doctor Emmett Brown. "...lightning is going to strike the clock tower at precisely 10:04 PM next Saturday Night!" :D

[@marcoantoniodasilvabatista7203]

my mother was born in 1968

[@Langkowski]

I woner what Walt Disney would have thought had he seen this

[@joeprete7424]

Is that a typo? "Attitude", Shouldn't it be "Altitude"?

[@Agarwaen]

no, "attitude" refers to making it point in the correct direction

[@bradleykrebs8290]

/watch?v=p-EKzlNQ8BM the perfect soundtrack to this.

[@chargersfan1111]

Sweet

[@ramade9040]

Sour

[@chargersfan1111]

@@ramade9040 Salty

[@marblesthecat3861]

Is this the secret plans to the Death Star?!?!?!

[@u.v.s.5583]

The Death Brick. It falls on your head and you are - dead. (No pun intended)

[@gleaming999]

It's a trap!

[@MetallicaBand2]

I think Michael Bay needs to remake/reboot this "movie".

[@vinnytheplayer5500]

Better love story then twilight

[@jimmybuffet4970]

What the hell was an economist doing making a CGI movie at AT&T? Oh yeah, he was an engineer that was chosen to lead a group of economists hired by AT&T to pre-empt anti-trust suits. There are people in some quarters that argue AT&T was unfairly targeted for years, but let's be honest: Look at what you did to SW Bell. The feds were right all along.

[@howiedewin3688]

reminds me of asteroids

[@TheRaym0ndish]

.....and its gone!

[@MatvaNabor]

Eat your heart out, Crysis 2!

[@waltsal2364]

Rae

[@invisibletenants]

looks much better than the graphix in the 70's and early 80's... what happened??

[@arvizturotukorfurogep6235]

This video is probably pre-rendered on supercomputers of the time, monstrous, feeble, and expensive technology with "oh so serious" purposes, not the cheap but fleshed out consumer technology of consoles and microcomputers that were in shops. The 80s equivalent of high-end CGI is like that can be seen in movies like Tron, The Last Starfighter, Computer Dreams, or even in arcade games like Cube Quest or I, Robot

[@RapiDEraZeR]

what are you talking about? these are just wireframe models

[@tuesday6597]

invisibletenants weird science had pretty good graphixxxx

[@bryede]

I'm guessing this was done using a process which exposed lines on film.

[@nholt]

the cgi still looks fake

[@spidermarcusPOP]

lol

[@Parzival224]

That cgi sent men to the moon in '69.

[@airdriver]

januainferni Good point! When I'm talking to my younger co-workers and they laugh at the old technology I grew up with(Rotary dial telephones, Atari computers, ect) I remind them that we landed men on the moon with tech much older than that, Then I grab one of their iPhones and say,"You guys got a THOUSAND times the computing power that landed the spacecraft on the moon forty years ago. So what are you doing with it? Playing video games?" My goal is not to come down on them. I hated that crap when I was their age. My goal was to plant an idea in their heads in order to challenge them.

[@nicolek4076]

airdriver Rotary dial telephone!!!! Luxury. When I was young, living in outer London, our phone had no dial. You lifted the handset and asked the operator to connect your call.

[@nicolek4076]

Alan Nikolai Stratmann Never ask a lady her age. I belong to that generation where that courtesy holds.

[@machewgun503]

bether graphics than the next gen

[@danmanx2]

hahahahahaha

[@michaeldavidson8971]

It had a good plot, boring non-existing characters (besides the box.) The narration is rather bland and the film quite short and left me wishing for some closure. I'm sorry, I'd have to give this two thumbs DOWN.

[@nemesi8800]

then in 1969 the americans "landed" on the moon... Yup... definitely

[@AAvfx]

Finally, I've found the real first 3D animation ever, thanks 👍🙏💕

[@omanajz]

It's not the first, this was made in 1963. The firsts were made in 1961 by John Whitney Sr.

[@JulianR2JG]

No, it's existed as early as 1958. kzbin.info/www/bejne/fYLaoWmDZ9ZkhKc

[@madmaxbocka]

That is the monolith of 2001: A Space Odyssey

[@RyanSchweitzer77]

The genesis of CGI right here--thank you, AT&T for posting this. Little did people know what would come after this....

[@the123king]

Spacewar! wasn't long after this: kzbin.info/www/bejne/iJ7Zk2d-oNmpbbc

[@billgateskilledmyuncle23]

Pretty good for the 60s. I bet that computer was huge!

[@oldtwinsna8347]

No, not really. It was an IBM 7094 mainframe. The main "frame" consisting of the processing module was about the size of two refrigerators. You had to run a bunch of tape drives and punch card reader equipment though, so that took up most of a large room.

[@charlesroberts3650]

oldtwins na: "No, not really". OF COURSE it was huge.

[@turle8645]

@@oldtwinsna8347 still pretty huge by today’s standards

[@northamericanpichu]

AT&T knows how to make a computer animation in the 1960’s but can’t get us coverage that doesn’t suck

[@alekz1958]

Increadable and I also learnt something new today not realising theat the moon has one side always pointing to earth. Only took me 62 years to learn that. Thanks for the informative archived videos

[@iLikeTheUDK]

I don't really agree with you, but speaking of 1963 and America stealing from other countries, 1963 was the year in which "Doctor Who" first aired, and when "Star Trek" first aired in 1966, they ripped off not a few concepts from Doctor Who - The Borg, for example, are clearly based on the Cybermen.

[@JohnWick-qr4yc]

We went from this to being able to create CGI films like Avatar 2 in 60 years

[@mcwooley]

Vector displays are amazing! We had a used Vectrex when I was a kid and I hope the laser vector displays become affordable soon

[@zsuiram22]

Lepsze niż animacje w Wiadomościach na TVP :D

[@SENTRYXX]

Death Star is coming

[@DavidandHAL9000]

It's good to have archive circuits activated.

[@philbox17]

It is not only the first Computer-Generated Films, it is also the first thoughts and visualisation of the Universe, in it's conscience. To understand time, gravity and magnetism. Time is a revolution or rotation in a number of seconds, beats. Gravity is the fundamental force of the Universe that began to shape matter into place. Magnetism is more in effect after Iron creation and formation by the Stars.

[@braindamage_eclipse]

This is what I want my ComputerWorld (queue music) to be... hyperrealism is overrated.

[@robotnut]

That's no moon!

[@KC9UDX]

It's FAKE!

[@paulandrews298]

I remember when I thought Pong was cool

[@charlesroberts3650]

In the wider scope of time, it is.

[@woobykal68]

thats impressive for 1963

[@waltsal2364]

Con. Mu. New ka zion

[@TOFMDrone]

this has better graphics then some hollywood "blockbusters" and is stil a better love story then twiglight!

[@ronniedelahoussayechauvin6717]

Weird

[@Mcfaddenskyler]

Orbits: 9

[@ixea_idol9392]

Ayo, it’s the model that sung Daisy Bell!

[@maidstone1982]

computers are impressive.

[@qba1012]

Render time: 53h 12m 10s

[@titmouse-distribution]

XD

[@TypicalFrogman]

Per few frames

[@hannahl4108]

Absolutely amazing

[@Lauderdalesfinest954754]

Sphere Telstar..lol

[@kayom2000]

How was this visually recorded at this time?

[@u.v.s.5583]

Probably with a big stationary telephonic apparatus with mechanical dials :)

[@user-gk1mp1zk7n]

Read the description

[@mackenzierynebagtong8549]

Its just a demo.