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Wednesday, May 27, 2009

SIGGRAPH 2009 Technical Papers Focus on Technology and Advanced Techniques.


The SIGGRAPH 2009 Technical Papers program is the premier global forum presenting groundbreaking research from today's leading international organizations. Topics will feature the latest computer graphic innovations from a detailed simulation of intrusive surgical procedures to the development of infra-red flash photography. A total of 439 submissions were reviewed by a distinguished panel of 54 jurors, and 78 papers were selected for presentation at SIGGRAPH 2009.

Papers cover core topics of computer graphics, such as modeling, animation, rendering, imaging, and human-computer interaction, and also explore related fields of audio, robotics, visualization, and perception.

"These research papers provide a preview of the latest advances in computer graphics, and they highlight how important computer graphics are to art, science, medicine, and other fields," stated Tom Funkhouser, SIGGRAPH 2009 Technical Papers Chair from Princeton University. "SIGGRAPH papers have historically provided the most groundbreaking innovations in computer graphics. This content represents some of the greatest achievements in this field from across the globe and could very well lead to advancements that impact all of our lives."

Select highlights from the SIGGRAPH 2009 Papers Program include:

Interactive Simulation of Surgical Needle Insertion and Steering
This paper presents algorithms for simulating and visualizing the insertion and steering of needles through deformable tissues for surgical training and planning. Novel features include a fast mesh maintenance algorithm and physics-based methods for needle-tissue coupling.
Authors:
James F. O'Brien, University of California, Berkeley
Nuttapong Chentanez, University of California, Berkeley
Ron Alterovitz, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Daniel Ritchie, University of California, Berkeley
Lita Cho, University of California, Berkeley
Kris Hauser, University of California, Berkeley
Ken Goldberg, University of California, Berkeley
Jonathan Shewchuk, University of California, Berkeley

Bokode: Imperceptible Visual Tags for Camera-Based Interaction From a Distance
Detailed analysis of how to enable a commodity camera to photograph and capture a 3mm barcode from two meters away. The key is to exploit camera bokeh, which maps binary data encoded in directionally varying rays into a large disk. The next step is to decode ID as well as camera pose for augmented reality applications.
Authors:
Ankit Mohan, MIT
Grace Woo, MIT
Shinsaku Hiura, Osaka University
Quinn Smithwick, Media Lab MIT
Ramesh Raskar, Media Lab MIT

Dark Flash Photography
Camera flashes produce intrusive bursts of light that disturb or dazzle. In this paper, a "dark" camera flash is presented that uses infra-red and ultra-violet light just outside the visible range to capture pictures in low-light conditions while being two orders of magnitude dimmer than a conventional flash.
Authors:
Dilip Krishnan, New York University
Rob Fergus, New York University

Real-Time Hand-Tracking with a Color Glove
This research describes a system that can reconstruct the pose of the hand from a single image wearing a multi-colored glove and demonstrates a system as a user-input device for desktop virtual reality applications.
Authors:
Robert Y. Wang, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Jovan Popovic, Adobe Systems Incorporated, University of Washington, and MIT

Harmonic Fluids
This presentation proposes an algorithm for synthesizing familiar bubble-based fluid sounds such as splashing, pouring, and babbling. The researchers acoustically augment existing incompressible fluid solvers with particle-based models for acoustic bubble creation, vibration, advection, and radiation. Acoustic transfer functions are estimated using the fast dual-domain boundary integral Helmholtz solver.
Authors:
Changxi Zheng, Cornell University
Doug James, Cornell University

Directable, High-Resolution Simulation of Fire on the GPU
This presentation proposes a hybrid particle and grid simulation system which utilizes graphics hardware (GPU) to quickly simulate artist-directable, high-resolution fire. Simulation resolutions as high as 2048 are able to be computed in a few hours by parallelizing work among multiple GPUs.
Author:
Christopher Jon Horvath, Industrial Light & Magic

Based upon the popularity of the program at SIGGRAPH 2008, this year's Technical Papers program is once again expanding to include 19 conference presentations for each paper published this year in the journal ACM Transactions on Graphics (TOG).


Related links:
SIGGRAPH 2009
Technical Papers
ACM

Grin Studios lets go of 160 people

Sad news today.

Not sure of the specifics but apparently Sweden has been taking a hammering.

This really sucks because I was hoping to work there one day. Seemed like a cool company.

Anyway I wanted to post this so headhunters could get ready.

Good luck in finding new positions guys. Talent always finds a way.

Pixologic released new plugins for Zbrush - Decimation Master, 3D Print Exporter

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With 3DPrint Exporter you will be able to export your favorite ZTool in STL and VRML file formats, opening you to the world of 3D Printing.

Who has never dreamed about having your virtual sculpting in "real" 3D, standing on your desk? Now it's possible for you to print your ZBrush models:

  • Sculpt your art with ZBrush
  • Optimize if needed your model with the Decimation Master plugin
  • Export it with 3D Print Exporter
Main features
  • Export in STL, Binary and Ascii.
  • Export in VRML.
  • Size in Inches and millimeters.
  • Export the current or all the SubTools.
"The new decimation and STL exportation tools have filled the weakest link in my work flow from creation to fabrication. you could spend many thousands of dollars and not get a better decimator or translator."
T.S. Wittelsbach - House of Wittelsbach - Jeweller

"The 3D Print Exporter continues to save my life on a daily basis. The quality I'm able to get out of ZBrush as a usable file that my other programs can handle has made me a happy camper. You have just opened up a new world for me!."
Adam Ross - Idol Workshop

"Finally! - a direct export from ZBrush to print format! This tool will help decrease the time it takes to get a ZBrush sculpture ready for 3d print production, and open up the services of most 3D Printing Service Bureaus."
Bill Henderson - Creative Director - Offload Studios Inc.


"Going from the final design to rapid protoyping ready parts has been a timely production within itself... That has now been eliminated with Decimation Master and the 3D Printer Exporter plugin for ZBrush. The ability to go directly from ZBrush to a optimized scaled prototype part, eliminating any other software in between, is priceless. Once again Pixologic turns the technical to art."
Jason Lopes - Senior Systems Engineer - Legacy Effects



Dagger
Model Courtesy of Adam Ross

Snake
Click to enlarge - Model Courtesy of Yann Bajard, Maq3D

This plugin is available for Windows
You can get it from the Download Center.

(The Mac version will be released within 30 days)

Click Here to Download the Documentation


Pixologic released 2 new plugins for Zbrush... 3D Print Exporter and Decimation Master

3DPrint Exporter you will be able to export your favorite ZTool in STL and VRML file formats, for 3D printing!
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/sh...ad.php?t=071266


With the Decimation Master plugin you will be able to easily reduce the polygon count of your 3D models while keeping all the sculpted details from ZBrush.
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/zbc/showthread.php?t=71265

Download issue 118's Short Cuts animation

In issue 118's Short Cuts section, Andy Price discovers that killing off a film's protagonist multiple times provides an ideal stage for a black comedy. Download Dans La T?te, here



You can read more about the making of ‘Dans La T?te‘ in issue 118 of 3D World.

Watch 'Dans La T?te'
In most browsers, right-click on the link and select Save As to download the movie (31 MB)

The video requires QuickTime 7
Get QuickTime Player

Visit the Dans La T?te website

Latest 3D work from ZOO

Post-production studio ZOO created 3D skeletons and landscapes for BBC show The Link: Uncovering Our Earliest Ancestor

Project name: The Link: Uncovering Our Earliest Ancestor

Production Company: Atlantic Productions

Post production: ZOO

Post Producer: James Prosser

Watch it: 26 May 2009 at 9pm on BBC ONE

The brief was to create scientifically accurate 3D skeletons for a 47 million year-old creature, based on an early primate fossil named Ida.



Starting by commissioning a 3D scan of a ring-tailed lemur skeleton, ZOO used the base model to rebuild the Ida skeleton model with scientific accuracy.

ZOO were also tasked with creating a landscape of the Messel pit site in Germany were the Ida fossil was preserved.

The team used the Vue environment software to form a dynamic landscape and Particle Flow for the explosion, dust and debris.



Compositing and grading on all 3D images was done using After Effects and rendered using mental ray.

The work will be shown in The Link: Uncovering Our Earliest Ancestor on BBC1 on 26 May at 9pm.

Dug's Special Mission: Up DVD/Blu-ray Exclusive Short

We all know that Pixar adds a new short film to their new DVD/Blu-ray release, what we didn’t know is what exactly would be included with Up.

We also don’t know what Dug’s Special Mission is, but we’ll be finding out this Fall! What we did know (or at least we predicted) was that Ronnie del Carmen would be directing. A little back story: The pack of dogs Alpha, Beta and Gamma send Dug on this phony excursion, but as it turns out, the dopey dog ends up finding what they were looking for! The new Pixar short film, Dug’s Special Mission, chronicles what it was that the lovable talking mutt was doing before he meets Carl and Russell.

This announcement comes from SciFi Wire’s interview with Up producer Jonas Rivera who tells the website:
"You can imagine we collect so much stuff along the way that doesn’t make it in… There’s, like, volumes and volumes…"
Of course, he’s talking about the great stuff you’ll find in The Art of Up (out today) and the exclusive home video release of Dug’s Special Mission. In more Up DVD/Blu-ray news, Jonas Rivera confirms that the Pixar team has prepared lots of making of featurettes and documentaries on subjects like the tepuis.

Let’s not forget about the theatrical short Partly Cloudy which you’ll be able to see in just 3 days and of course on the home video. Support Ronnie del Carmen’s new book My Name is Dug, by purchasing it here.

(Thanks, JD/via SciFi Wire)

What do you think about this announcement? Was it what you expected? Are you excited?

New Guerrilla CG Video : Basics of UV Mapping

Hi everyone, we've got a new free video over at the Guerrilla CG Project (www.guerrillacg.org)...

Robby Frank has made this video on The Basics of UV mapping for all the newbies!


Here Robby Frank covers the basics of texture unwrapping, otherwise known as UV mapping, the process of wrapping a texture onto a 3d object. We show how a flat image can be warped onto objects to add texture. This method is used widely in 3d graphics, and is used for a variety of maps including, color, specular, bump, displacement, normal mapping and more.

Cheers guys, has been a while since the last update, hopefully we'll get some more up soon.
ta
-andrew

CGDC confirms ten more speakers, including Blizzard Entertainment, EA, Ubisoft, Microsoft, THQ, NCsoft and more.


The organizing committee of the China Game Developers Conference (CGDC) 2009 and Howell International Trade Fair Ltd. recently announced the participation of 10 more outstanding representatives from domestic and overseas game companies as speakers or panellists. CGDC 2009 is going to be held on July 24-26, 2009 at the Shanghai International Convention Center, comprising a three-day conference program with 47 general sessions.

According to the spoke-person from the organizing committee, the organizer started inviting speakers right after all the conference topics were confirmed and gained support from game enterprises worldwide, including Blizzard Entertainment, EA, Ubisoft, Microsoft, THQ, NCSOFT, NEXON, Giant Network, Shanda Games, Tencent, The9, Netease, Perfect World, 9 You and Kingsoft. Speakers are gradually confirmed according to the inspection and evaluation of the papers done by the advisory board. The organizing committee will announce all speakers over the course of the next few weeks.

Conference registration for CGDC pass have now started; CGPA now calls on their members, totaling 130 game companies, to collect information from their technical staff and purchase group passes from the organizing committee. With the annual opportunity of exchanging ideas, share experience with other game companies worldwide, CGDC offers a great opportunity to all industry professionals and developers that is not to be missed.

CGDC 2009 speakers:
Taewon Yun, Platform Operation Director, Blizzard Software Development (Shanghai) Company Ltd.

David Kristofer Fried, Senior Game Designer, Ubisoft Shanghai.

Lei Zhang, Senior Audio Expert, Ubisoft Shanghai.

Ben Mowery, Director, Scaleform.

Yuxin Ren, Senior Executive Vice President, Tencent Corporate.

Quan Chen, NVIDIA PhysX Tech Support Engineer

Jerry Mao, Vice President, Object software

Yongquan Li, R&D Technical Director

Xinchun Gu
, Senior Development Manager, The9 Co., Ltd.

Shiying Wang, Director and Producer, The9 Co. Ltd

The organizing committee is looking forward to confirming more outstanding speakers soon, and at the same time the conference registration has started. There is a 10% early bird discount register before June 10, 2009.

Related links:
China GDC
China GDC information
Registration Form [PDF]

Luxology and Escape Studios to host modo 401 Roadshow at Moving Picture Company in London.


Luxology LLC, in partnership with Escape Studios, is bringing its modo 401 Roadshow to England with an exciting launch event in London on June 3, 2009. This event will showcase the newest version of Luxology's innovative 3D modeling, painting and rendering software, modo 401, and will include presentations from the Luxology team and leading artists already employing the software in their productions.

The modo 401 demonstration, using Roadshow sponsor Wacom's latest Intuos tablet technology, will be given by Andy Brown, Luxology's training division manager. Speaking at the event is freelance artist Robin Konieczny, whose work at various prestigious VFX studios appears in music videos for The Gorillas, visual effects for The BBC and the Discovery Channel, as well as various shots in 'The Da Vinci Code,' HBO's 'Rome,' '10,000 BC,' 'Hellboy 2' and 'Angels and Demons.'

In addition, Simon Hodgkiss, director and producer of SPHdigital Ltd., will be previewing his use of modo 401 in a multi-application pipeline for the upcoming pilot, 'The Adventures of Raz & Benny,' and Stuart Rowbottom, modo 401 beta tester and freelance 3D artist with experience at The Senate VFX, Framestore and Passion Pictures, will also be on hand to speak with attendees.

Event location and date are as follows:
The Moving Picture Company
127 Wardour Street
Soho, London
W1F 0NL
GREAT BRITAIN

Wednesday, June 3, 2009
2:30pm - 5:00pm



Related links:
Escape Studios
Luxology modo 401
Moving Picture Company

The Kinematograph Trailer

Go to this website for trailer of upcoming short animation of platige ... http://www.thekinematograph.com/en/