A feature length animated film whose visual component is entirely computer generated. The voices are usually performed by voice actors. This term is often applied to films in the tradition of Disney's animated masterpieces like Snow White.
One of the first successful computer animated films was Pixar's Toy Story, released by Disney in 1995. In 1998 Pixar produced A Bug's Life and Dreamworks released Antz, both showing dramatic visual improvements over Toy Story. Pixar's 1999 Toy Story 2 was a more than worthy successor, showcasing new levels of artistic manipulation of the rapidly advancing tool that is CG. In 2001 Dreamworks returned the service with a new computer animated film called Shrek, this time taking Disney's animated masterpieces head-on.
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within is expected to be the next generation of CGI (computer generated images) — a computer animated film that will bring to life the closest approximation of photo realistic humans ever to act on film. In another year, the FF movie will itself be eclipsed by the next big thing. Such is the way of technology. Still, it is exciting to experience the maturation of the dacades-old art form of computer generated images.