Art vs. Technology - the eternal battle

Let me start off by quoting John Lasseter "Art challenges technology, technology inspires art."

A lot of people have told me that once computers and gadgetry come in, art loses its value and its a different story all together. I strongly disagree. Let me just keep CGI in this perspective or argument.
Good art doesn't lose its value no matter what the medium is, it doesn't matter if one is using sand or electronics to create or express an idea. The genesis of art is creation.

Lets compare the CGI medium to painting, where in a painting you have an artist with canvas and colors painting a scene, with CGI, we have a team of artists using technology as a paint brush to create digital art. I would say at times its tougher to create something impressive with computer graphics, especially when concerned with huge undertaking like a movie, because you dont have one artist who is creating a masterpiece but tens or at times hundreds of talented artists working towards a single idea. One might argue saying the Director is the master-painter, but the director is a part of the core idea and working with this huge team to generate a work of art.

The challenges that current CGI tools face are the fact that they are not very artist centric, but more technical in their approach often forming a notion that its very 'un friendly'. But if we look back at the CGI softwares in the early 90's, forget the 80's, one would be surprised to see how far we have come in just about 10 years. Its a huge leap. Early faces of computer graphics seen in movies like Star Wars (the famous Death Star Trench simulation, which took months to create) was very very technical, mainly depending on lines of code and nothing else. Looking at this, how can someone compare an art form that is about 20 or maybe 30 years old to something that is hundreds of years old or even compare it to 2D animation which is about 100 years old.

CGI softwares are becoming more and more user friendly as the days go by, with interactive creation environments and node based workflows that allow you to work the way you think thus maintaining your idea or thought process. Computers are becoming increasingly fast to deliver your mental image at almost real time. At the end of the day it largely applies on the way it is utilized and how it expresses an idea and not just used because its the "in" thing.

Traditional art has evolved through the ages, for centuries man have moved on from cave painting to sculptures to various other forms. The CG industry is at its infancy. The best way to sum this up is as Rob Cook put it, “We are at the engineer's model of Computer Graphics not the drivers level.” To explain, imagine starting a Model T Ford in the early 1900's, You would need to crank the engine up with out dislocating your shoulder, then run and jump into your four wheeled wagon, pull and push levers to get going, then concentrate on the steering wheel. All of this and still moving at a snail's pace. This is where we are currently in the CGI industry. We are still a good distance away from keyless entry, push the ignition, let the cabin temperature adjust itself, floor the accelerator and race with the might of 800 horses :)

Imagine how much more futher we have to go and how exciting its going to get.