The Goddess Shines on America

For the production of movie special effects, the importance of computers is self-evident. With its help, not only can many special effects be made extremely simple, but also many effects that are difficult to achieve manually can be easily put on the screen.

So as early as when Lucas was making his Star Wars, he took the lead in pioneering the method of renting the computing power of supercomputers to assist in the production of special effects for movies. Although this will certainly have a considerable cost, just look at the effect of "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan" in 1982, which was the first computer-assisted shooting, and compare it with "Alien" in 1979. It's clear at a glance.

And that was in 1982, even the most powerful supercomputer in the world at that time, its computing power was only 400 million times per second, and "Wrath of Khan" did not rent an exaggerated share. And now, the guy at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, California, where Alice and Maiya are heading to has a total of 3.9 billion times!

What is the concept of 3.9 billion times?

It is roughly equivalent to a Core i3 dual-core processor in the 21st century, and it has a higher frequency and is close to the grade of the i5 series.

However, it is still impossible for Alice to rent all the computers that were just released last year, so the only thing she can get is a Pentium 4 processor level.

Pretty rubbish.

But enough.

Mr. Akaman is a soldier, and Maiya is very independent, and she still goes to "office" with Alice, so Aunt Kaori who stays at home has no objection to her daughter suddenly going out of town just before dinner. In this way, the two girls were asked to raid other people's laboratories in the middle of the night, hundreds of miles away from Los Angeles.

Overall, the process went smoothly.

Even if laymen don't know the specific status of this national laboratory, since it has the most powerful supercomputer newly released last year, it is obviously not comparable to that of ordinary scientific research institutes. For this kind of laboratory with a full schedule, there are a large number of people working even in the early hours of the morning. Of course, they will not be caught off guard by the uninvited arrival of the two girls.

As for the rental invitation, it went very smoothly.

Supercomputers in any era have a business of renting out. The question is who the renter is and how long it needs to be rented. For the capitalist United States, if Alice is at the forefront and buys many, many supercomputers and most of them with a huge amount of money, even if NASA wants to study rocket launches, they have to queue up honestly.

The end result is that Alice rents 75% of the computing power of this supercomputer with 3.9 billion operations per second, which is equal to the low-end Core i3 processor, at a price of 10 million U.S. dollars, and the rental period is four months.

Fortunately, this computer just settled in the laboratory last year. Many enterprises and institutions that need computing power are still lined up with other supercomputers. Otherwise, it would not be Alice's turn to take over three quarters of the share.

Well, 75% of 3.9 billion times, although it is still rubbish, but it can still be equal to the original Core i3, at least much better than the Pentium 4.

A total of 10 million US dollars was only used to rent supercomputers. Such a huge expenditure made Maiya almost speechless in astonishment. However, what Alice said made her even more speechless.

"The more developed the economy is, the more movies will be produced at high cost, and there will be many similar situations in the future. Let alone one or two thousand dollars, even if it is hundreds of millions of dollars in shooting costs, after 2005 it will definitely be will appear!"

As for why it was 2005, Maiya certainly had nothing to say, but she did feel that what Alice said was correct. Looking back at the filming costs and box office in Hollywood, isn't it just getting higher and higher?

Of course, neither the receipt of the ten million dollars nor the start of the lease period will take effect from now on. After all, Alice hasn't even revised the script yet, and Cameron, as the director, has to recruit actors immediately, and Mr. Lawrence also plans to be the producer himself, and there are still many related jobs.

So, when Maiya drove the Hummer, filled up the gas three times, and finally returned to Los Angeles, Alice was about to show up at DreamWorks again.

This is a film with unprecedented investment costs!

Whether it is the cost history of Alice and DreamWorks, or all the movies in the entire history of Hollywood, the cost of this "Alien 2" will be the biggest!

"Ten million dollars, just to rent a supercomputer!?"

In the office of the chairman of DreamWorks at noon on a weekday, Lawrence was startled from ear to ear by the sky-high price: "Is it necessary to be so extravagant!? Even Lucas's Star Wars A New Hope, the entire shooting cost is only 1,300 10,000,000? 10,000,000 just to rent a computer, how high are you going to make the shooting cost!?"

However, if Lawrence was concerned about money, Cameron laughed excitedly like a child who was looking forward to a year and just got his dream Christmas gift: "The most advanced supercomputer in the world! 75 % computer share! Haha, Alice, tell me well, when you and that girl Akaman went to the laboratory, did those people get scared stupid!?"

"I was really taken aback."

Alice admittedly smiled and said: "Ten million dollars, for a laboratory, this is a sky-high income, enough for them to conduct many experiments. After I showed the proof of property, the director seemed to be afraid that I would go back on my word Seems like, hurry up and urge me to hand over the deposit, the whole process is unbelievably smooth."

However, Lawrence still looked distressed: "But it's 10 million, I spent so much last year promoting "Ghost Story" for you, even if you paid for it yourself, 10 million... ..."

“Uncle Roger, why did you suddenly fall into Qian’s eye?”

Alice propped her chin on one hand, and looked at Lawrence with contempt: "The problem is to look at it the other way around. Since this movie spent so much money on special effects, how can the box office be bad? I relied on "Ghost Story" The person who made 200 million at the box office, the subject matter and the nature of the sequel of "Alien 2" are here, but if the box office exceeds 100 million, isn't that a huge profit?"

"Roger is simply distressed."

Sitting in the corner of the sofa, Maiya, who was purely acting as a driver for Alice, now had a cashew nut in her mouth, and suddenly interrupted: "But Alice, now that you have computing power, how do you plan to use it? Hire Industrial Light \u0026 Magic needs a lot of expenses, right? That’s not counting equipment rental, I think you’re going to rent armored vehicles from the U.S. military if you can’t afford it, right?”

Lawrence nodded vigorously and smiled wryly: "This is what I'm worried about, Alice, Lucas' asking price has never been cheap, if you can guarantee that you can handle the special effects by yourself, I won't be so Distressed, but..."

"Then let Alice be my special effects artist!"

Cameron opened his mouth, and with Alice's generous investment, his whole body's excitement was aroused: "The last movie was the director, and "Invasion of Brain Cells" was the screenwriter. I said girl, since you are so eloquent, special effects The position of group leader should be taken, right?"

"Just kidding, it's just like playing."

Of course, Alice took over the job: "With my brain, the endless creativity in my head, and my computer technology, I can make special effects for your movie. Wouldn't it be easy to die?"

Seeing the girl bragging about her smartness so carelessly, the two adults in the room and a high school girl immediately burst out laughing.

"Okay, okay, then I will hire one less person!"

Cameron patted Alice on the shoulder vigorously, but then said again: "However, you are not a professional special effects artist after all, and I still need to hire some people in the industry. Let me see..."

"Currently the only one doing computer special effects in the industry is Industrial Light and Magic, okay?"

Alice waved her hand and said, "Leave the job to me, don't worry. The Industrial Light \u0026 Magic gang, to put it bluntly, is nothing more than a collection of experts from different schools of thought. You just need to hire some of them as they are... Let me see." ..."

After thinking about what technology "Alien 2" needs to use, Alice said: "Model designer and mechanical designer, each of these two types of people hires five people to help me, that's enough!"

Really enough.

Whether it is the design of the spaceship shape, the design of various sci-fi firearms, or the design of colonial buildings, etc., with Alice's head, the design drawings are all concepts formed at one time. There are five model designers and five mechanical designers each, and they are responsible for making it by themselves according to Alice's request. Just like a field command center has many mining probes, it is enough to simply obey the orders.

Cameron thought about it briefly and agreed.

If it was another little girl who ran in front of him and said these things, if it wasn't for the sake of being a girl, he, Cameron, would have kicked her out a long time ago.

But since it is Alice, a girl who has become a multi-millionaire by relying on technical patents at such a young age, it is another matter.

After all, since she has already thrown 10 million into renting computers, she won't ruin the movie she invested in, will she?

"But I have a question."

But Cameron still has a question: "You are the only one who knows how to operate a computer. Since you have rented so much computing power, you must have a way to make computer special effects, right? What software do you use? Is it from Industrial Light and Magic?"

"Oh, this..."

Alice rubbed her chin: "Maya, Premiere, After-Effects, Nuke, Fusion, Combustion, there are many that can be used."

Cameron frowned deeply, forming deep forehead lines: "Maya... which company's software is this? Why haven't I heard of it?"

"Oh, of course you haven't heard of it."

Alice shrugged her shoulders and smiled: "Because these are the software I developed myself when I was bored, and I plan to open another IT company to buy them~"

"The name of the company is...?"

"Adobe! Don't ask me why I started so loudly, I just think it sounds good!"

"I didn't ask..."