A History of CGRG/ACCAD at
The Ohio State University

In 1981, Chuck Csuri approached an investor (Robert Kanuth of The Cranston Companies) to transfer the computer animation technology created in the CGRG lab to the commercial world, and Cranston/Csuri Productions, Inc. (CCP) was formed. It moved, along with CGRG to a Columbus facility, the former Academy for Contemporary Problems building, at 1501 Neil Avenue in Columbus. This co-location of the two organizations was important to the continuing development of each. Kanuth appointed one of his officers at The Cranston Companies, Jim Kristoff, as President of CCP, and he recruited six of the CGRG researchers to join the company as a core group.

These six CCP staff (Michael Collery, Wayne Carlson, Bob Marshall, Don Stredney, Ed Tripp, and Marc Howard) rewrote the software that was in the research lab so that it was more user-friendly and less research oriented, and added specialized utilities for character animation, procedural effects, rendering, geometric modeling and post production. This suite of software was used to provide animation for television and advertising until CCP went out of business in late 1987. Julian Gomez rewrote the animation language Twixt for use at CCP, also. During the first year of the company, they also created a sequence of animations that were edited together into a preliminary demonstration reel to take to potential clients.

CCP Logo
This composite image, by Tom Longtin, includes the CCP logo designed by John Weber in the upper left corner. The other images were research for dynamic models. Click on it to see an animation by Susan Van Baerle of the logo.

CCP Headquarters
Located at 1501 Neil in Columbus, the building had a spectacular lobby and was a very creative environment, with modern computing facilities,   including the VAX 11/780s and 11/750s shown in the above image.

Special purpose hardware included the Marc III and Marc IV custom frame buffers, which were designed and built by CCP employee Marc Howard. These frame buffers provided the ability to do extended low resolution motion tests that were stored in frame buffer memory and played back in real time. CCP used Vax 11/750s, 11/780s, Pyramid computers, Sun workstations, a Megatek and an IMI vector displays, E&S Picture Systems, and a modified Ampex Electronic Still Store (ESS), which was designed for slow motion replay by the television network sports industry. Images were calculated and stored on one of several magnetic disks; the machine was programmable to facilitate the 30fps playback with a direct NTSC video output. CCP also had a Celco 4000 film recorder, which could be used for 16mm, 35mm and 70mm motion picture film, or 35mm slide or 4x5 transparency still output.

CCP Equipment
CCP used Vax 750/780 and Pyramid computers, with an array of peripheral devices. The above images show Maria Palazzi on the IMI-500 graphics workstation; the Celco 4000 film recorder; Steve Martino at a camera/scanning station and using the Megatek display; the Ampex ESS-2 Electronic Still Store; Bob Lyon at the Ampex 2 VTR; Jeff Light, Sally Pryor, Maria Palazzi and Jose Garabis at terminals connected to the Marc IV framebuffers; and Hsuen Ho at a VT100 terminal with a monitor displaying the contents of the Marc III frame buffer.

During the 7 year period that they were in business, CCP produced almost 800 animation projects for over 400 clients world-wide (see a list of the projects and clients at CCP-clients.html). The software was also licensed in 1985 to Japan Computer Graphics Laboratory (JCGL) for use in the Japanese market, and was eventually sold to Lamb and Co. in Minneapolis.

Key projects included: opening graphics for 3 Super Bowls; the on-air sports promotions for ABC, CBS, NBC, and ESPN networks; news opens and promos for all of ABC's news shows, as well as news opens for CBS, CBN, Fox and PBS; international network promos for ARD (Germany) CBC (Canada) ABC (Australia), Globo (Brazil) and Scottish Television; entertainment graphics for ABC, NBC, CBS, Turner, Showtime, HBO, Fox, and over 100 local affiliates; award winning ads for TRW, Sony, Proctor and Gamble, AEP, G.E., and Dow; music videos for Krokus, Twisted Sister and Chaka Khan; special projects for Goldcrest Films (The Body Machine), CoMap and the Annenberg Foundation (VISUmap animations for "For All Practical Purposes" mathematics telecourse.)

CCP Images
The images above are a sampling of work done by CCP animators. Starting from top left, the ray tracing was done by Bob Conley, Tom Longtin animated the gears, John Donkin composed the ice cream parlor, and Mike Collery animated Pencil City. (Click on the image to view the animation). Commercial work included CBS Sports Super Bowl XX open, Wonderworks for PBS, a graphic arts promotion for SIGGRAPH 85, ESPN SpeedWorld, CBS Sports Super Bowl XVIII open, and a scene from the Nightline promotion for ABC News. Tom Longtin generated the Klein bottle image, and Don Stredney created the pool table.

To view more images from CCP productions, go to the image page by clicking here.

During this period, CCP staff continued to extend the research boundaries and publish new and innovative results. Former staff members included Shaun Ho (SGI), Michael Collery (PDI), Scott Dyer (Nelvana), Jeff Light and John Berton (ILM),Susan Van Baerle, Maria Palazzi (ACCAD), Doug Kingsbury, John Donkin, Peter Carswell (ACCAD), Paul Sidlo (RezN8), Jim Kristoff and Dobbie Schiff (Metrolight),Rick McKee (SGI), Jean Cunningham (PDI), John Townley and Steve Martino (click3west and now Blue Sky), Tom Longtin and many others.

In 1987, as a result of several factors, including a hesitation on the part of the investors in the company to diversify and expand into the film market, the developing games market, or the software licensing market, the company closed. Another critical factor in the demise of the company was that it was heavily capitalized, with large and slow mainframe computers, custom display hardware and proprietary software. The introduction of integrated workstations, such as the Sun and SGI IRIS workstations, and commercial software, ie Wavefront, allowed small boutique companies to enter the market at a fraction of the investment that CCP had committed, and the ability to compete in the television market was diminished.

The software was purchased by Lamb and Company in Minneapolis, and some of the management of CCP moved to Los Angeles to form Metrolight Productions (President Jim Kristoff and Director of Sales Dobbie Schiff) and RezN8 Productions (Creative Director Paul Sidlo).

Chuck Csuri left CCP in 1985 to return to his OSU duties at CGRG, and Vice President Wayne Carlson took over the Presidency of CCP in 1987 in order to see it through Chapter 11 liquidation, and returned as an Assistant Professor to the Ohio State Computer Science Department when the company closed. He later became Director of ACCAD and Professor in the Department of Design.

Ho's Ray-tracing
Hsuen Chung Ho programmed this animation to demonstrate ray-tracing coupled with environment mapping of a secondary animation, Pencil City.