Scanimate

The analog dream machine

Before pixels, there were knobs.

Scanimate made the bright, slippery, wonderfully electronic motion graphics of the 1970s and ’80s—in real time. This is Dave Sieg’s archive of the people, places, machines, and happy accidents behind it.

Watch the 17-minute story See how the machine worked
A complete Scanimate analog animation computer, packed with patch panels, scopes, knobs, and CRT displays
One computer. A wall of controls. No undo button.
What
Analog computer
When
’70s & ’80s
Speed
Real time
Vibe
Electric

Start here

Meet the machine.

If you only watch one thing, make it this. Dave Sieg and animator Roy Weinstock tell the story of a machine that could turn a drawing into fluid television animation while the client watched.

“Once upon a time (but not so long ago), making animation with computers was pretty farfetched futuristic wizardry.”
From Dave’s original welcome

A few brave souls believed it was the future, and helped start what is today a major industry. This site celebrates the colorful past they made together.

Watch on Vimeo · From Lynda.com on Vimeo · Ask Dave a question

Pick a wire

Explore the archive.

Technical explanations, firsthand memories, photos from the shops, demo-reel frames, and the odd bit of mischief. The old site is all still here—just easier to find.

Scanimate camera and CRT hardware

How it worked

A pictorial walk through the cameras, waveforms, patch panels, colorizer, computer, and tape machines.

Open the machine → An early Animac system, the precursor to Scanimate

The analog days

Dave’s history of analog computer animation, written for the SIGGRAPH 98 History Project.

Read the history → A colorful frame of vintage electronic animation

See it move

Vintage Scanimate video from Computer Image, Image West, Dolphin, and other sources.

Watch the reels → A grid of Image West motion-graphics frames

Image gallery

Dozens of project stills and thumbnails. Click through for the full-size originals.

Browse pictures → Scanimate alumni Roy Weinstock and Ed Kramer

The ScaniManiacs

The operators, artists, engineers, clients, and characters who made this strange thing sing.

Meet the people → Dave Holman at Computer Image

Dave Holman remembers

His firsthand Computer Image memoirs were so good, Dave gave him his own section.

Read the memoir →

The long history article was originally part of the SIGGRAPH 98 History Project.

Dave Sieg with Gigi beside the Scanimate archive
Dave Sieg, keeper of the knobs—and Gigi.

Long overdue Scanimate news · Updated June 3, 2022

Hi! I’m Dave Sieg.

Back in the 1980’s I was chief engineer at Image West in Hollywood, CA. Image West had initially been set up by Computer Image corp of Denver, CO in the mid 1970’s.

CI had designed and built several Scanimate analog animation computers and they had become quite popular with advertisers and networks due to their ability to produce animation in real time. Image West was an attempt to tackle the west coast market, but things had not gone well.

The bank forced Computer Image to sell Image West and one of CI’s customers was a Canadian company called Omnibus. They took over the company and were successful in marketing the Scanimates in Hollywood, particularly after producing some material for the first Star Wars film.

The back story continued

Knob school

Introduction to Scanimate.

Dave walks through the basics, then opens the cabinet and gets down to the analog circuits. Three parts, zero marketing department.

Part 1 Basics of how Scanimate works Part 2 More hands-on operation Part 3 Inside the analog circuits

Also preserved from the original front page: the Vice documentary embed, Nick Campbell’s 360° Scanimate room view, and an old Flash-era YouTube embed.

Support the archive

The Scanimate DVDs.

The original site was—and is—a personal preservation effort. DVD sales are how Dave has helped pay for the work.

The Dream Machine DVD-2 case

“Dream Machine” DVD-2

The demo reels show the work. This second DVD interviews many of the pioneers whose work with Scanimate broke ground for today’s animation industry, including the story of Lee Harrison and Computer Image.

Contents and ordering →

Scanimate DVD-1 First Edition case

DVD-1 First Edition

Two hours of classic ’70s and ’80s electronic animation produced by the “Dream Machine” and the companies that built and used Scanimate computers.

Contents and ordering →

Everything means everything

The full site archive.

No content or old links were thrown out. This index reaches every original HTML page, including the wonderfully deep-cut material.

Old or malformed links get a dashed red outline and stay right where they are, ready for a human with a soldering iron.

From Dave

Help keep the lights on.

This site represents the efforts of many individuals over many years. I am only trying to preserve a little piece of history, not take credit for it!

Please help support this effort by buying the Scanimate DVDs. That is the only way I have to pay for this work. Your generous comments and support are greatly appreciated!

Dave Sieg

Drop something in the tip jar

The original PayPal donation button is preserved below.