oscars

It was a big night for Hollywood Sunday night, what with the biggest stars and best films being celebrated at the 80th Academy Awards.

But, unexpectedly, it also turned into a big night for Nintendo and its popular Wii video game console.

At one point in the show, as the broadcast came back from commercial, host Jon Stewart appeared on-stage playing tennis on the Wii, with the game displayed on the Oscars' giant screen.

It was a funny moment, and in keeping with Stewart's contemporary wit.

And while Nintendo must have known about it in advance--otherwise, how could the … Read more

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts gave out its its first Oscars for 2007 at the Scientific and Technical Awards dinner Saturday. One of the top awards was given to a group of 20 geeks for "stable, semi-Lagrangian fluid flows" or technology that makes water appear to flow realistically in movies. The dinner for the movie technology is usually a drab affair compared to Oscar night but an exception was actress Jessica Alba. While presenting an award, the star impressed the geeks with her charm and ability to pronounce even the most difficult scientific terms.

Read the full … Read more

CULVER CITY, Calif.--One of the things that struck me towards the end of the animated surfing penguin mockumentary, Surf's Up, is that I had forgotten that every bit of water in the film--mainly loads of lovingly rendered surfing waves--was digitally animated.

Even after that realization, I looked at the water in the film and thought the animators had done a remarkable job at recreating one of the things that, like making human hair look realistic, has always been hardest to recreate.

Others must agree, because last month, Surf's Up was chosen as one three nominees for … Read more

As you probably have heard by now, it's Oscar nominations day, and Hollywood is all a-buzz.

But up here in the Bay Area, there are some pretty happy people as well.

That's because the folks at Lucasfilm divisions Industrial Light & Magic and Skywalker Sound were honored with a total of six nominations Tuesday.

ILM was nominated for its visual effects work on both Transformers and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End.

ILM's John Knoll and Hal Hickel, who were nominated for their work on both of the two previous Pirates films, and who won … Read more

To the British, at least, video games are now officially acknowledged as an art form on par with movies and TV.

Well, maybe that's a stretch. But the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) has announced that it has added Sims creator Will Wright as a fellow, a prestigious honor that has previously gone to the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Steven Spielberg and Alfred Hitchcock, according to PC World (via Variety).

This is pretty cool. If you're not familiar with Wright, well, he's generally considered the reigning king of video games. In part that's … Read more

YouTube has launched the first ever YouTube Awards with 70 videos in seven categories. This week viewers can vote to pick their favorites of 2006. It's kind of like the Oscars, but for user-generated video clips such as Lonelygirl15 and Ask a Ninja. As of right now, there's nothing on the awards page but a bunch of comments from confused users who have made their way to the site to find nothing to vote on. Digging deeper, clicking on playlist shows a full listing of clips. We're assuming there will be a voting system similar to the … Read more

It's Oscar time! Well, it was a week ago, anyway. Tom Merritt and I have the gadgets that those celebs should have received in their goodie bags! Here are some of our favorites:

Most would agree that trash is smelly, no fun to look at, and tastes funny. This is why garbage cans with lids were invented.

Lidded cans solved the problem of not having to look at or smell trash, but the risk of brushing one's hand up against dirty trash-can flaps still existed for some time. This led to the discovery of foot-pedal-operated trash cans.

And now, in this age of cell phones and 60-plus-inch HDTVs, comes the dawn of self-opening trash cans. Options abound, just as long as you're willing to drop a couple hundred dollars on something … Read more

YouTube and CBS have announced a partnership in the form of a contest for a chance to be featured during a Super Bowl commercial. YouTubers need simply create a 15-second video of anything they want and join the 15-second user group. The top five videos are picked by judges and put up on CBS.com, where people can vote on which one deserves the spot.

Dove is doing something similar for the Academy Awards, but the winners for that contest will get their own party out of it. There's no prize or revenue-sharing for this YouTube contest, so you'… Read more