彭蒙惠英语：Hollywood Studios Are Hot Customers（在线收听）

Hollywood Studios Are Hot Customers

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Crunch time

When crunch time came with the production of Shrek 2, DreamWorks tapped all of its 1,000 computers. But that wasn’t enough. So it plugged into HP’s “utility rendering service,” effectively borrowing another 500 powerful computer servers at HP. During the rendering process, a computer takes software instructions from a programmer and creates an image out of millions of digital dots known as pixels. All told, DreamWorks used 10 million computer hours to complete the movie—more than three times the computing power it used in the first Shrek.

Much of the production in Shrek was dedicated to rendering human faces. They had to look like the real thing: The characters’ hair had to move just right, and light had to bounce off objects and produce shadows in precisely the right way. If not, the animations would destroy the illusion of reality and distract the viewer.

Because the artists had the utility rendering service at their disposal, Ken Bielenberg, visual effects supervisor on Shrek 2, said they didn’t have to plunder computing power from Madagascar, which was being worked on at the same time. Now DreamWorks plans to use its own in-house computers at the beginning of every film, then finish production with HP’s utility rendering service.

Time is money

In Shark Tale, DreamWorks used 1,000 HP servers as well as 300 of its own to render the movie, which included a complex scene where more than 16,000 computer-animated fish swam together. The companies also established a joint-marketing partnership for DreamWorks’ Madagascar.

Gene Becker, director of utility services for HP Labs, said the rendering services “doesn’t help DreamWorks do better stories, but it helps them stay on schedule, and that’s important with a $100 million budget.”

DreamWorks Animation President Patti Burke agrees. “As crunch time approaches, you have to get the pixels out the door.”

Vocabulary Focus

plug into (v phr) to start using or being involved in something

at one’s disposal (idiom) available to be used by someone

plunder (v) [5plQndE] to steal or remove something precious from something or someone

Specialized Terms

joint-marketing (adj) 联合营销的 relating to the process by which products and services are introduced to the marketplace by two or more companies