This historical video was recently re-discovered after being lost for many years. It was produced in 1972 and is believed to be the world’s first computer-generated 3D animation. It was created by Ed Catmull, a true pioneer of 3D technology, who was a computer scientist at the University of Utah (birthplace of the famous Utah teapot.) If the name sounds familiar, it’s because a few years later he was one of the founders of Pixar.
40 Year Old 3D Computer Graphics (Pixar, 1972) from Robby Ingebretsen on Vimeo.