Mathematical Applications Group

Mathematical Applications Group, Inc. (a.k.a. MAGI or MAGI/Synthavision) was an early computer technology company founded in 1966 by Dr. Philip Mittelman and located in Elmsford, New York, where it was evaluating nuclear radiation exposure. In 1972, the graphics group called MAGI/SynthaVision was formed at MAGI by Robert Goldstein.

It was one of four companies hired to create the CGI animation for the film Tron. MAGI was responsible for the most of the CGI animation in the first half of Tron, while Triple-I worked mainly on the second half of the film. MAGI modeled and animated the light cycles, recognizers and tanks.

Product and legacy

MAGI developed a software program called Synthavision to create CGI images and films. Synthavision was one of the first systems to implement the later concept of ray-tracing for making images. The software was a constructive solid geometry (CSG) system, in that the geometry was solid primitives with combinatorial operators (such as Boolean operators). Synthavision's modeling method does not use polygons or wireframe meshes that most CGI companies use today. The combination of the solids modeling and ray tracing (later to become plane firing) made it a very robust system that could generate high quality images.

MAGI created the world's first CGI advertisement for IBM. It featured 3D letters that flew out of an office machine.

History

In 1972, MAGI/Synthavision was started by Robert Goldstein, with Bo Gehring and Larry Elin covering the design and film/television interests, respectively.

Tron

In 1981, MAGI was hired by Disney to create half of the majority of the 20 minutes of CGI needed for the film Tron. Twenty minutes of CGI animation, in the early 1980s, was extremely gutsy, and so MAGI was a portion of the CGI animation, while other companies were hired to do the other animation shots. Since Synthavision was easy to animate and could create fluid motion and movement, MAGI was assigned with most of Tron's action sequences. These classic scenes include the light cycle sequence and Clu's tank and recognizer pursuit scene. Despite the high quality images that Synthavision was able to create, the CSG solids modeling could not create anything with complex shapes and multiple curves, so simpler objects like the light cycles and tanks were assigned to MAGI. MAGI was given $1.2 million to finance the animation needed for Tron. MAGI needed more R&D and many other engineers who were working in government contacts at MAGI were assigned back into MAGI's "Synthavision" division.

MAGI sped up the process of supplying its work to Disney Studios in Burbank by a transcontinental computer hook-up. Before each scene was finalized in MAGI's lab in Elmsford, New York, it was previewed on a computer monitor at Disney. Corrections could then be made in the scene immediately. Previously, the only way of previewing the scene was to film it, ship it to Burbank, get corrections made, ship it back to Elmsford, and continue this "ping-ponging" until the scene was correct. The computer link cut between two-and-a-half to five days from the creation of each scene.^[1]

During the production of Tron, animators and computer image choreographers Bill Kroyer and Jerry Rees invited John Lasseter (who would later co-found the famous CGI studio Pixar) to see some the light cycle animation. Lasseter said in "The Making of Tron" featurette that the light cycle animation was the first CGI animation he had ever seen.

After Tron

In 1983, Disney commissioned MAGI to create a test film featuring characters from the children's book "Where the Wild Things Are". The test used CGI animation for the background and traditional 2D animation for the main of the book character "Max" and his dog. What is notable is that this test film was directed by John Lasseter of Toy Story and Pixar fame.

In 1984, MAGI opened an office in Los Angeles, California. This office was headed by Richard Taylor, who worked as Special Effects Supervisor while at Triple-I. This Los Angeles office was closed shortly after its establishment.

Soon after, MAGI was sold to a Canadian firm, Bidmax, and the employees left to other CGI companies and universities. Phillip Mittelman, the founder of MAGI, died in 2000.

References