A few weeks back James Cameron spoke at the TED conference about the very successful movie Avatar and a few influences to the movie. At the time I had not seen Avatar, but this week right before it left theaters I finally watched it (twice) and understand his lecture a great deal more.. It’s pretty amazing how much influence Abyss the movie had to Avatar and how Titanic was the fund raiser for it.
Watch the video above or on TEDtalks.

“James Cameron’s big-budget (and even bigger-grossing) films create unreal worlds all their own. In this personal talk, he reveals his childhood fascination with the fantastic — from reading science fiction to deep-sea diving — and how it ultimately drove the success of his blockbuster hits “Aliens,” “The Terminator,” “Titanic” and “Avatar.””