While timeless treasures like Shrek tend to hog the contemporary spotlight, the history of CGI is steeped in drama and glory. We didn't get our start by animating ogre noises for kids.

There are so many types of CGI to contend with. What was the first CGI movie? Is it all Pixar, or do we have a few other behind-the-scenes heroes to thank for our favorite CGI films? John Lasseter and Brad Bird are only the latest in a long line of visionaries. There's a lot to unpack here.

The History of CGI in Movies

Just like many of the other terrifying things that surround us, CGI is actually a product of academia, secret government experiments, and a lot of research and personal study on the part of a few notable VIPs.

Two of the most famous minds caught between the art of war and the art of creation were John Whitney and Larry Cuba. It was Whitney who first realized that the technology behind anti-aircraft turrets could be used to plot points on a Cartesian field. These points could be used to draw anything digitally—a completely new notion at the time.

After finally managing to procure some of these machines as army surplus, he and Cuba were able to put their radical ideas to the ultimate test. They were the first to coin the term "motion control", and these "cam machines" made their first digital, geometric CGI collaborations possible.

These abstract standalone experiments were very simple, but something about them aroused the curiosity of those lucky enough to bear witness to them. In 1960, Whitney and his partner went into business officially under the brand Motion Graphics, Inc.

The duo released several collections of these mathematical CGI animations; many of their peers would then go on to mimic their work. Whitney's self-proclaimed secret was his devotion to the concept of harmonic progression—smooth motion and camera movement that lulls the viewer into submission.

In 1958, Alfred Hitchcock made things official. Vertigo's opening sequence features some of the psychedelic stylings characteristic of Whitney's early work. These animations carry no real narrative content, though. Many gloss over this one in favor of more thematically-relevant achievements in this area.

The First Pixar Movie

Pixar Animation Studios.
Image Credit: P.gobin/Wikimedia Commons

Pixar, before going on to revolutionize the world of feature-length animation, actually made its first splash on the big screen as a smaller part of a live-action film. This was back when Pixar was still just a subsidiary of Lucasfilm and working alongside Industrial Light & Magic, the industry leader in special effects in film at the time.

The script for the 1985 film Young Sherlock Holmes called for a knight to be brought to life from the panes of a stained-glass window in a church. John Lasseter was the driving force behind this sequence; from here, he would go on to direct some of the most famous Pixar films of all time, including Toy Story, A Bug's Life, and Cars.

The year after, Steve Jobs acquired Pixar from Lucasfilm. And in 1995, we finally had the world's first feature-length CGI film, Toy Story.

The First Movie to Use CGI

CGI in a general sense dates back a few more years, although not quite in the fully-fledged form that the knight from Young Sherlock Holmes embodies. Tron, for example, utilized computer-generated images to simulate the feeling of being in a virtual world three years previously, in 1982.

Both of these scenes in Tron and Young Sherlock Holmes did, in fact, include live-action actors. Does it count? It depends on who you ask.

In 1973, Westworld used CGI to emulate a robot's point of view. The scene invites the viewer into the world's first completely CGI-based sequence, creating the feeling of a heat-seeking effect. These were rendered 2D images and essentially cobbled together by hand, but the look was novel, especially for 1973.

Talk to the Hand

Westworld was succeeded by another film called Futureworld. This sequel brought the original team back together to do much of the same type of stuff as before. This time, however, the work of a few talented newcomers was invited into the fold.

Ed Catmull and Fred Parke, still graduate students at the University of Utah at the time, were two aspiring computer scientists on the cutting edge of the first CGI movement. One project of theirs, a model of Ed Catmull's hand, ended up leaving the impression of a lifetime on the scientific community.

Catmull in particular wanted to explore many of the challenges associated with rendering digital images, all obstacles impeding the progress of others. One of these problems was rendering curved surfaces—vital if one wishes to emulate real-life objects like human beings.

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"A Computer Animated Hand" made the rounds, premiering officially in 1973 as a submission in a computer science convention. Once Hollywood had caught wind of their triumphant breakthrough, the best and the brightest just had to get a taste for themselves.

This famous animation was displayed on computer screens during the film, making it something more akin to a prop than anything else. Still, audiences were stunned. It was unlike anything that had ever been shown in theaters previously.

The hand's cameo appearance in Futureworld was admittedly a minor one, but its legacy lives on. We love this piece of history because it's so meta. Catmull doesn't just show us the finished project, he walks us through its creation step-by-step and puts it through the rigors of a few basic poses before giving us a look at the inside.

The animation itself was created in 1972, which means that it actually predates some of these other accomplishments. The fact that the hand didn't make its on-screen debut until 1976 leaves Catmull and Parke's big win a contested one, however. But they'll always be number one in our hearts.

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The First CGI Blockbusters

Although laughably tame by today's standards, Larry Cuba's take on the Death Star in 1977 is one of the most iconic moments in the history of film production. A product of the University of Illinois, even this extremely simple animation pushed the technology that Cuba had at his disposal to its very limit.

Jurassic Park, one of the most deeply-loved Spielberg joints of all time, used a combination of CGI and animatronic dummies to create each terrifying scene. In terms of screentime, about a third of the dinosaur visuals were composed entirely of CGI, all at the hands of Industrial Light & Magic.

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The Future of CGI

Fun fact: a crew of 27 people brought Toy Story to life. For comparison, that's approximately 570 fewer than what a modern Pixar film requires. These are industry-scale projects that unfold not over the course of months, but years.

All of the above is a testament to the power of vision, creative energy, and force of will in this business—these innovators had nothing to work with, but their ingenuity laid a rock-solid foundation for those to follow. The first CGI effects used in movies were relatively simple, yet these scenes are some of the most memorable images of our lifetimes.

If you're ever short on inspiration as a 3D animator, take a step back and look at where we were even a decade ago.