John Whitney, A Pioneer of Computer Animation

John Whitney: "Catalog" (1961)


John Whitney: "Arabesque" (1975)

John Whitney (1917-1995) was an American pioneer of computer animation, who created his 1960s works (surprisingly looking a lot like 1990s rave videos -- nihil novum sub sole?) with a mechanical analogue computer, adapting a WWII M-5 Antiaircraft Gun Director and combined with multiple-axis rotating cameras. By the 1970s Whitney had already switched to digital processes. (Whitney was also responsible for the animated title sequence of Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 Vertigo, after the design of Saul Bass.)

[via Feuilleton]