Linux in Hollywood

Linux got its big Hollywood break in 1997 when Digital Domain (D2) used Linux to render the special effects for Titanic.

DreamWorks' Shrek, released in 2001, was the first blockbuster to be both authored and rendered using Linux but when DreamWorks/PDI produced Shrek on a Linux platform, it was done using internally developed software. Little commercial software for making movies was available for Linux at that time.

Today, three of the most popular 3D animation drawing packages are available in Linux versions: SideFx Houdini (Linux in 1999), Alias Maya (Linux in 2001), and SoftImage (Linux in 2001). Artists using Alias Maya might be interested to learn that there is an Association for production companies using Maya.

The irony of the migration of software to Linux is that Apple and Pixar became leading suppliers of Linux software. When Industrial Light and Magic switched to Linux it meant upgrading all of the studio's old copies of SGI-based SoftImage software to Linux all at once.

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