I took some time to float through the Emerging Technologies as the final day of the Singapore show began.
This part of SIGGRAPH Asia is perched like a dark cave up the end of the third floor of Suntec complex. Many strange and wonderful research projects are inside. Tomoe Moriyama, the Emerging Technology co-chair, guided me around the dark room. Tomoe is also the curator of Tokyo University’s Museum of Contemporary Art.
My favorite display was the Long Bar, a scene created by Prof. Russell Pensyl from Nanyang University here in Singapore. An augmented reality scene is played out with virtual actors, ceiling fans, a bar and a pet tiger. Using a headset, the viewer can become part of that scene, moving in and around the action, and viewing it from any angle.
The Computer Animation Festival Awards were staged last night while I was down at the Reception party. A quirky short called ‘This Way Up’ created by the guys at Nexus Productions took out the Best of Show Award. One of the Jury Awards went to the creators at Gobelins for 'Oktapodi', while the other Jury Award went to Taku Kimura of DigiWorks for 'Kudan'. He and Takashi Fukumoto just happened to be sitting next to me as I wrote this. The CAF Chair, Jinny Choo came up and introduced me.
Earlier this week I had lunch with the chair of the Yokohama SIGGRAPH Asia 2009, Masa Inakage. Also, with me was Hyeong-Seok Ko, the chair of the 2010 SIGGRAPH Asia, to be staged in Seoul, Korea.
I asked Masa about expectations of a theme for the Yokohama show. He told me there was a mixture of design and technology around each SIGGRAPH, but the idea for next year would be to take the best of SIGGRAPH culture and to blend in the unique Japanese angle. His perspective included robotics, anime and the communication of interactive techniques.
The advent of cell-phone technology into everyday lives has transformed the humble cell phone into a new media device faster and more widespread in Japan than many countries in Asia. “From a business perspective,” he continued, “cell phones represent and can convey a totally new set of media. This will be the 150th anniversary of the opening of the port of Yokohama, so this will be a very special time for the city.”
Hyeong-Seok told me that Seoul has been designated as the World Design Capital for 2010. SIGGRAPH will fit in quite naturally in the whole design theme.
This afternoon, I also talked to a very relaxed and happy YT Lee, the chair for this year’s show. “I am walking round feeling a little redundant, but am also very pleased the SIGGRAPH Asia show has succeeded,” he said. Instead of now having a break, YT is going back to his university job and digging into the emails. “Life doesn’t stop,” he smiled. Thank you to the great team at SIGGRAPH Asia and ACM for a great show.
The halls were well populated despite the parties that went to all hours last night.
Daniel Maskit chaired a collection of quick Sketches this morning called ‘Art & Robots.’ This included a demonstration of some lighting pipeline tools by Kathy Roberts and Graham Jack from Britains’ Double Negative feature VFX studio. Kathy showed the dnSpangle, a ‘shotbuild’ OpenGL lighting tool. This system can build a list of elements in Maya with a single button, with no changes required.
Just noting from the Job Fair here that Double Negative is set to open a studio in Singapore in the very close future. Singapore is truly becoming an attractive place to work.
Rob Cook took the theatre stage also today to deliver the Second Featured Keynote. A true legend from Pixar, he also concurred with Don Greenberg in his speech yesterday, calling for a doubled effort to lean towards scientific research at the SIGGRAPH conferences. Meanwhile, the reference to the art of CG was never far away. Cook gave some quotable quotes through his talk, while walking us through the history of the company’s successful animated films. From ‘Luxo Jnr’ to ‘Finding Nemo’ to ‘Ratatouille’.
He said CG is just another way of painting a picture. The difference is that with Pixar, the painter is the team and the brush is a computer. The challenge is to not get lost in that, and to keep the story in sight at all times.
Why do the new paradigms keep renewing in technology? Cook seemed to like those deep quotes: ‘Artists think of things they don’t know are impossible, while technologists are too proud to say ‘no, it can’t be done’. He recommended Thomas Kuhn’s book, “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” as a good read.
At the end of the speech, a question was asked from the audience by his former teacher Don Greenberg about what the next generation of artists be taught. To which Cook suggested a solid base of basic fundamental Computer Science and Engineering as well as some creative pursuits. Left brain, right brain balance. His reasoning was that even for artists wanting to pursue work in CG, there is a tremendous range of jobs well away from the computer. It’s all about the story and how that can be told and refined.
After that session, I needed to refuel and took off to the show floor. A gathering of minds was underway at the SIGGRAPH Village, hosted by the crew of Yokohama in 2009. Great to meet more faces for the Japanese show. I needed some battery changes before taking the bus over to the Marina Barrage.
The Marina’s lookout peers out over a large fresh water reservoir that is part of the most ambitious engineering feat since so much of the city was reclaimed. Singapore never ceases to amaze me.
SIGGRAPH Asia was officially opened today in Singapore.
The conference chair YT Lee acknowledged the huge contribution from volunteers active in the background and the unstinting support of the ACM. The story of SIGGRAPH is now being richly enhanced with the new Asian flavor.
Featured speaker Don Greenberg handed out an entertaining view of his long career at Cornell University. He showed the ground-breaking architectural fly-through of the science block created at his school in the early 60s. He’d obtained the go-ahead for the building project on the strength of the video display, which was years ahead of its time.
Turning to SIGGRAPH, Greenberg felt there was plenty of room to welcome in more raw research once again, instead of relying too much on the Media and Entertainment sector. “If we were to plot the fields of graphics research being shown, from 25 years ago to today, it would resemble the top half of an hourglass,” he said. “We are currently at the bottleneck of the glass and I think it’s time for us to expand our boundaries.”
The Lucasfilm Animation team from Singapore took over the Suntec Theatre after lunch. Dan Janevski, from the Matte Painting crew on ‘Iron Man’ showed the many wonderful ways that Matte Painting had evolved over the years. Rolling through scenes from ‘Blade Runner,’ ‘King Kong’ (1933) and ‘Iron Man’, his premise was that the suspension of disbelief was the goal for all matte painters over the ages. “Having the compositors covering up all that hard work was the next challenge,” he joked.
Kalene Dunsmoor talked brightly about other challenges for the artist, in driving the story elements of many scenes. While story is king, basic artistic principles can urge viewers to focus on any particular area of the screen. “Artists see a lot of things in reality, but sometimes they just don’t really look. Visuals have to tell a clear story.” Kalene earned a laugh when she added, “I can make you guys look where ever I want you to look.”
Steamy rain was slamming down outside in the afternoon as Lee Stringer took a packed auditorium through the TV series pipeline for ‘The Clone Wars.’ Matt Aldrich rallied some sympathy, especially when it came to sharing the assets for the game produced at the same time for the DS platform. “Working the detailed fight sequences previously seen on cinematic projection into a screen size of 256 x 192 pixels can become quite a challenge,” Aldrich said. “But we love challenges.”
This evening huge crowds danced to a very loud band played at the Arena for the Lucasfilm Animation Studio. This was billed as the ‘Blur Party in Asia’. Meanwhile, NVIDIA and the Digital Bollywood Initiative hosted a more laid back affair at the Rupee Room and The NYU Tisch School of the Arts opened up at Kay Siang Road. A very late night was had by most. Parties in Singapore are an entirely new chapter in the SIGGRAPH story.
The Chair of the SIGGRAPH Asia conference, YT Lee was down in the foyer sending off the class to the NCU for the Pixar RenderMan course this morning.
They’d been lining up since 7am. That’s dedication. Lee said he was happy and relieved the many programs had begun to roll into action.
Upstairs, a full day course exploring Programming with OpenGL had begun. This was my chance to immerse myself in the depths of four-dimensional homogeneous coordinates and Dave Shreiner from ARM, Inc. and Ed Angel from the Uni of New Mexico were my coaches. Tracking geometric transformations was demonstrated and Shreiner described how the x,y,z,w interplayed within the OpenGL API.
Although this discipline is rich, deep and dry, I appreciated the cool way these guys could bring it into perspective for an interested observer like myself. Before the OpenGL Shading Language was brought into play I had to run to my next presentation.
Tad Leckman, the Director of Training here in Singapore for Lucasfilm Animation shared great advice for the job hunt in ‘Finding your Place in Digital Production.’ He was out front with Patricia Kung from Animal Logic, where she is the senior recruiter in Sydney. Advice like researching the different titles given to each crew position; doing as much research into what one job you want, and get to know the company you want to work for. If you can do more than one thing very well, generate different flavoured reels. Check out some professional reels of studios and artists on the web. Tad Leckman noted the work of Leif Jeffers at Blue Sky, and Max Bickley as having the best show reels that displayed their clear talents.
This evening I caught the Fast Forward Session of the SIGGRAPH Sketches. As Sketches and Posters Chair for SIGGRAPH Asia, Diego Gutierrez's job over the past year and a half has been gathering together the wealth of knowledge from academia and industry. "One of the most important aspects of the job was coming up with the final list of accepted submissions”, he told me. “We discussed every entry, based on the reviews we had from the committee and external reviewers. We ended up accepting 35 sketches and 12 posters out of 113 submissions. We organized the sessions for the final program, notified the authors, and now we're ready to go."
In the Posters section, the team from the Keio University shows a Digital See-Through Telescope. This display is also making an appearance in the Emerging Technologies as a fast mover. The Waseda University team shows some plausible 3D Face generation, all from a still photograph.
"There's way too much going on to single out any individual track or program," says Gutierrez. "There are Courses, Art, Emerging Technologies as well as the Posters. The excitement of this conference comes from so many different angles. This is precisely what makes SIGGRAPH so unique."
I shot over to the Autodesk User Group Meet to see Rob Hoffman welcome Softimage|XSI into the family. News from that camp is that XSI, and Face Robot will remain standalone products, while CAT will be incorporated into 3ds Max in the not too distant future. A string of cool demos from Duncan Brinsmead, Imageworks’ Barry Weiss and ‘Master Zap’ were followed by a short walk to the waterside party, complete with food, drink, live music and a bunch of colourful stilt walkers.
Like many new arrivals into Singapore I took a walk around town to find my bearings this morning.
Singapore has turned on the heat and the food and the spectacle. The city spread has more than adequate room for the biggest visiting conference crowd. The Suntec Convention Center is just so central, with Raffles, the Pan Pacific, the Radisson hotel and many others a very short walk away. Many other good quality establishments are sprinkled round the CBD. Suntec is the only place to stage the first Asian SIGGRAPH.
Another attraction here is the great food, found in astonishing varieties for very little cost. There are many food halls under the Suntec Tower where SIGGRAPH is that are jammed with office workers each lunch time, catering for literally every taste variety imaginable. If you time it right, you can dodge the crowds and eat like a local. I found lunch with a combination hot –pot style of dish for four dollars.
The preparations for the show are slotting in tightly. The registration booth seemed empty just before the opening time, but sprang into action at the appointed moment. Clockwork. Lots of red T-shirted SIGGRAPH volunteers are already kitted up, giving directions and getting to know each other. With SIGGRAPH in Singapore, there is a tremendous atmosphere of new opportunity for younger Asian volunteers, as never before.
I checked out the Ballistic/BreakPoint Book shop on the third floor, near the Emerging Technologies area. I caught up with some fellow CGTalkers. Raymond Chua is a local Singaporean working in games; Morgan Barnard, a New Yorker working in Wellington, is presenting a paper on Saturday; and Fadi Yahya is an animator who flew in from Saudi Arabia. Now that’s dedication. They are each focused on Technical Papers and Courses as they make their way through the next few days.
About 30% of the materials accepted into this year’s Technical Papers program were from some part of Asia. Some of the region’s top minds have stepped up to chair sessions in the technical papers, such as Ken Anjyo of OLM Digital Inc.; Tong Xin of Microsoft Research China; and Hyeong-Seok Ko of Seoul National University.
Among the line-up at the Computer Animation Festival (CAF) is the first look at the new Capcom game Street Fighter IV by Polygon Pictures Inc.; an alternative ending to ‘I am Legend’; and that famous Speed Racer: Car Flip sequence. As always, each category has features from a wide range of sources, like Blizzard Games, Passion Pictures, Gobelins School and Nagoya City University.
The CAF also has one Best of Show and two Jury awards to give out. The endorsements are all generated from a panel of international judges. This will be on 11 December on the first day.
The field of speakers for the SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 Technical Papers is a roundup of thoroughly imaginative and brilliant practitioners. Their papers cover all grades of peer-reviewed research within the fields of visualisation, CAD and Virtual Reality as well as the leading areas of modeling, rendering, animation and computer power.
On Wednesday evening, the 10th of December, starting at 6pm at the Suntec Theatre in Singapore, there will be a Fast Forward session, covering the field of Technical Paper presentations available through the rest of the week.
The video above is the just-released preview of the SIGGRAPH Asia Technical Papers review. Please enjoy.
One of the sessions is a Character Animation series, spread over three days and chaired by Doug James. The first session explores skinning templates and the use of cage-based deformation plates for multiple characters.
Another group talks about their method of acquiring, modeling, compressing and synthesizing realistic detailed facial deformation.
The trade exhibition at SIGGRAPH Asia looks to be very informative, showing a wide display of technologies and talent.
More and more sessions and special guests are being announced as the opening date nears, those taking part on the trade show floor, appear to be lining up a show to be remembered. Autodesk Asia Pte Ltd has a huge display at #H01, which will include a pod especially for XSI. There will be a huge User Group Meeting at the Novotel Clarke Quay on the Wednesday evening of the show, followed by an Autodesk Party at a secret location.
The local Lucasfilm Animation Studios has a large presence here in Singapore also. It is their turn to show the visitors around. The studio is still offering a six-month apprenticeship called the JEDI MASTERS PROGRAM (JuMP) which combines classroom-based courses, department-based mentorship, and immersion in the production environment. Their stand will be one not to miss.
Christie Digital Systems USA Inc. will be showing off their digital projectors, now being taken up all over the world, in over 5,000 facilities. A pioneer in digital projection systems since 1979, Christie has established a global reputation as a total service provider and the world's single source manufacturer of a variety of display technologies and solutions.
Pixar Animation Studio will be flying across the ocean to make an appearance in the Singapore show. Watch for their special sessions as well.
IBM Singapore will be at SIGGRAPH Asia showing off it's next-Gen internet-scale computing solutions, the IBM System x iDataPlex. These incredibly efficient servers pack impressive computing power into a unique, space-optimized rack design. With up to twice the compute density of standard 1U racks and up to 40% higher energy efficiency. They will be demonstrating the new system at their booth and at the Special Sessions.
The New York University Tisch School of the Arts Asia opened its doors in Singapore just two months ago and is pleased to make their appearance in the inaugural SIGGRAPH exhibition in Asia.
There is also a chance for others to show their works and products, with the presence of Taiwanese market leader Leadtek, the Media Development Authority of Singapore and even the Agency for Science, Technology and Research or A*STAR as it is called, oversees 22 research institutes, consortia and centres, and supports extramural research with the universities, hospital research centres and other local and international partners. A few of their newest ground-breaking technologies will be making their debut at the coming exhibition.
The focus of the AMD exhibit stand are two new professional graphics accelerators ATI FirePro V5700 and ATI FirePro V3700. AMD will showcase ATI FirePro professional graphics accelerators and demonstrate how to "Dominate Your Design" in Booth G01.
If you haven’t yet registered yet, there is a way you can still register for an Exhibits Only Pass with the following code: ‘ExhibitsOnly_ASIA’. This code is valid on the SIGGRAPH Asia site until the 3rd December, after which time entry is limited to invite only.
The Exhibits Only pass will allow you access to the trade exhibition and the Exhibitors Tech Talks.
Don Greenberg is a pioneer of CG, and the director at the Cornell University Program of Computer Graphics, with a long history of successful stewardship behind him.
CGSociety contacted Don Greenberg to find out how he felt about being chosen as the first keynote speaker for the Inaugural SIGGRAPH Asia. When Don first started in the field of computer graphics, he says he, “felt like a man without a country”.
He told me about the beginnings of the industry. A time when CG was just being initially explored, when computer scientists just opening their own departments wanted to concentrate on more theoretical issues. “Back then, the technology was too simplistic to be accepted by the profession of architecture. Since computation was expensive, the engineers thought that making pictures with a computer was just a frivolous activity,” says Greenberg. “SIGGRAPH became my academic home and I am forever grateful. Having the opportunity to be first keynote speaker allows me to not only repay this wonderful organization but perhaps inspire emerging communities on the other side of the globe.”
Don Greenberg’s first academic disciplines were architecture and engineering. In both of these professions, the process consisted of concept, design and the building of real-world constructions. There was enormous satisfaction and pride from seeing something grow from concept to reality. “Who in CG doesn’t get the same thrill when they see their first picture on the screen?” Greenberg exclaims. “I feel very lucky to be in a field like this where the ability to generate a realistic image has also seduced hundreds of thousands of students into CG. Teachers get the same satisfaction when they see their students prosper.”
In a hint to his talk on Thursday, 11 December at the Suntec Movie Theatre in Singapore, Greenberg told me a crucial realisation is missing in the research of CG. “So many smart, well-educated, and creative people have entered into CG, not realizing how applicable the algorithms and tools they have developed are to other fields like biology, medicine, acoustics, or architectural and industrial design,” says Greenberg.
When I contacted Greenberg at Cornell University, I asked him about his work there and the history of those who made Cornell the place it is. When Cornell's Astronomy Professor Carl Sagan had the first opportunity to popularize science with BBC’s ‘Cosmos,’ he asked Greenberg to join him and to do the CG simulations. “Carl was not only a hero of mine but also a very close friend,” he says.
“I really wanted to do this and I had two eager students, George Joblove and Doug Kay, wanting to work on this project as well. Both went on to have very successful technical careers and have won Hollywood’s Technical Oscars as well,” explained Greenberg. “In the end, we couldn’t work on ‘Cosmos’ with our existing equipment without losing all of our sponsored research.” So Don had to turn down Carl’s request.
In the first proposal Don wrote to the National Science Foundation in the 70s, he had a section that proposed mapping the topography of the Martian surface so that data could be used for future space exploration. This portion was rejected with the comments that one would never need that information, as there would never be any landing on Mars. “I am sure Carl is laughing from above when he sees the success of his former student, Steve Squyres and the Mars Rover Mission,” quips Greenberg.
Don had the opportunity to teach at China’s Tsinghua University in the 1980s. It may have been one of the earliest CG courses ever taught in China. “Equipment was very expensive and students were attempting to write algorithms on machines with very limited capacity,” he describes. “Although I have been back to Asia several times, I have not really had the opportunity to see how far the field has progressed and I hope that Singapore’s SIGGRAPH will allow me that opportunity.”
SIGGRAPH is composed of a community of researchers who can help in a lot of fields, but the lure of the entertainment industry has been so great that much of their work has ignored these other disciplines. There are many problems that can be solved by algorithms and techniques invented in the CG community and I’d like to show how some of these can be applied. I hope to be able to talk about emerging opportunities for this field.
The Chairs of the SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 Art Gallery and Emerging Technologies have put together a spectacular series of displays that will be running each day in the East Gallery. The title of the show, Synthesis, refers to a kind of chaos, a random transformation of structured knowledge and exploration in digital art and emerging technologies.
In Synthesis, two of the most popular areas of SIGGRAPH are presented with an Asian taste. Emerging Technologies presents new ideas in prototype and ready-stages. It is hoped this will inspire further collaboration and industry interest. Tomoe Moriyama from the University of Tokyo is chairing this part of the show with Adrain Cheok from Singapore. "There are over 30 brilliant works altogether, and in all the projects, attendees can enjoy the vast potential and rich diversity of hybrid art and technologies," said Tomoe. Below is the just-released video to introduce the show.
The Art Gallery show at SIGGRAPH Asia consists of a widely selected art collection of film, displays, interactive works and thought-provoking presentations, including works from Kazuma Morino. He shows some astonishing pieces like Runners, where figures made up of geometric shapes rush around, intertwining with other objects. The work expresses the beauty of interacting objects over the course of time. Kazuma is also collaborating at the moment with musicians Ken Ishii and Yosui Inoue on their music videos.
SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 Emerging Technologies highlights include a display called 'Heaven's Mirror: Mirror Illusion Realised Outside of the Mirror'. With this system, users experience a mirror illusion through three modalities of feedback (haptic, visual, and auditory) and perceive a boundary-less transition between the real world and the world inside the mirror.
Mirrors sometimes provide illusions that distort physical laws. In Heaven's Mirror, the illusions become 'real' as users' visual, tactile, and auditory senses are immersed in the world inside the mirror. This opens new ways of using mirrors in virtual reality.
Heaven's Mirror focuses on the physical relationship between the real world and the world inside the mirror. It uses a mirror illusion and amplifies it to the real world so users can experience a mirror illusion through three modalities of feedback.
Stephanie Choo, the Co-Chair of the SIGGRAPH Asia describes the rest of the display. "Twenty works selected from nearly 300 entries, while different in content, application, and inspiration, have one thing in common: successful representation of culture and exploration. Through ground-breaking digital works, the artists question and invite responses from attendees. We are extremely pleased to bring to you, at the inaugural SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 in Singapore, a collection of exciting, inventive, and inspiring creative works that will certainly make its mark as the first in Asia."
The Second Featured Speaker at SIGGRAPH Asia is PIXAR's Rob Cook.
Cook was the co-architect and primary author of Pixar's RenderMan software, which creates photo-realistic computer images. In 2001, he received an Oscar for his contributions, the first Academy Award ever given for software. In the last 10 years, every film nominated for a Visual Effects Academy Award has used RenderMan. During an interview last week, Cook told CGSociety that in his SIGG Asia speech, he will be focusing on the interplay of art and technology when PIXAR creates its movies. "I'll be emphasizing things about that process that might be applicable to stuff other than making movies," he said. Rob certainly won't be among strangers in Singapore either. "The other featured speaker, Don Greenberg, was my professor in graduate school at Cornell University. I also know a number of the authors of the technical papers."
At Cornell, Cook worked on simulating realistic surfaces, taking CG images past the basic plastic coated look. In 1981, he developed the first programmable shader while at Lucasfilm/PIXAR, now an essential part of GPUs and game engines. He blended complex effects in CG creatives, with realistic lights and camera blur, known as the Monte Carlo effect. In 1987, he received the ACM SIGGRAPH Achievement Award in recognition of these contributions.
"I'm glad to see that the SIGGRAPH Asia papers program has that same high quality. I hope there are a lot of attendees from throughout Asia and that the conference becomes a major event with cutting-edge technology from the region," he says. "For a number of years, the SIGGRAPH community has become increasingly international. The three conferences SIGGRAPH, SIGGRAPH Asia, and Eurographics will span the year and the globe."
"I'm very delighted to be part of this challenging process, and it's been exciting to see the SIGGRAPH ASIA 2008 Computer Animation Festival take shape," says Jinny Choo, the Computer Animation Festival Chair for Singapore's SIGGRAPH Asia. "At the very beginning, we were worried, especially about the number of new materials we would receive with our submission deadline really close to that of SIGGRAPH's Computer Animation Festival. However, over 70 percent of the selected works are new materials compared to the SIGGRAPH 2008 show."
The work from the internationally renowned production studios attracted the committee's attention at the jury meeting, and at the same time, imaginative student work was singled out as well. "Now, we are ready to present the cutting edge of technology beyond genres and techniques," says Choo. "The SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 Computer Animation Festival is your opportunity to discover the full international spectrum of creativity and technological innovation. I hope you share our passion for animation and become part of the festival!"
There are Juried and Special programs being planned for the festival as well. A very popular feature of the SIGGRAPH conference for many years, the Electronic Theatre offers some of the world's most remarkable work selected by a distinguished international jury. In addition, works presented in the Electronic Theatre are eligible for festival prizes. The Best of Show and Jury Awards will be announced during SIGGRAPH Asia 2008.
There is a program of special screenings also, consisting of a School Showcase of promising student work, Studio Specials from the world's leading animation and visual effects experts, and the Best of SIGGRAPH Award Winners from previous Computer Animation Festivals.
Jinny Choo began her career as a film festival manager and curator for a couple of International Animation Festivals in Korea. As curator, one of her jobs is to seek out new films to present them at her festivals or other international animated film festivals. "The SIGGRAPH Computer Animation Festival showcase was one of my special programmes at SICAF(Seoul International Cartoon & Animation Festival) for many years," she explains. "I am a big fan of the cutting edge of CG myself."
CGSociety talks to SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 Conference Chair YT Lee on how the event is shaping up.
Conference Chair YT Lee's job is to assemble the team of program chairs, each to helm one of the seven featured programs. “I deem my job a success if I have very little to do,” he explains. “Each program chair takes his/her program and runs with it, and all I am left to do is high level coordination. That's very much the case, as far as content generation is concerned. The team is great!”
YT Lee is an associate professor at the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. His main area of interest in research and applications is CAD and related areas such as VR and simulation. He’s been a member of ACM SIGGRAPH for almost 30 years and has helped to run the ACM SIGGRAPH Singapore Chapter since its inception in 1998.
“The support from ACM SIGGRAPH is also great,” adds YT Lee. “They are totally committed to a successful SIGGRAPH Asia and gave me everything I need to do a good job. The investment of time and effort from the ACM SIGGRAPH Executive committee is more than I can hope for. I also have a great conference management team from Koelnmesse. They are superb, covering every angle well.”
SIGGRAPH in the USA has an ambience that draws people in, each attending with different expectations. “I feel enthused when immersed in that atmosphere, and look forward to seeing new ground breaking works,” adds Lee. “I look forward to creating the same atmosphere in SIGGRAPH Asia.”
YT Lee hopes for success at the inaugural SIGGRAPH Asia 2008, and defines this in four ways: • Good quality contents in good quantity. The contents are now in, and we are very satisfied on both counts. For example, we were hoping for 200 or so technical paper submissions, but got well over 300 instead out of which we accepted 59 of SIGGRAPH quality. There were nearly 600 animation submissions and we were hard pressed to filter it down to the last 60 or so. I pity our blurry-eyed jurors who had to sit through them all. • Good attendance. We are now working very hard to attract delegates, and keeping our fingers crossed. It's too early yet to count the chickens, but we are hopeful. • A satisfied audience, clamoring for more. I will be very happy if someone comes up to me at the conference to tell me that we should've staged this event in Asia years ago. • Financially sound. We are investing a lot in this event, money and effort. For SIGGRAPH Asia to have a future, this inaugural event must be financially successful, which I define as breaking even.
"Still, my job is all consuming, mainly in selling the conference to the world" says Lee. "There have been a lot of trips and meetings to publicise the event. SIGGRAPH is a well known name in CG, but not well known enough for people to make it a top priority to contribute to or attend its events. My and my team's footprints have covered most countries in the region over the last twelve months."
After years in planning, SIGGRAPH Asia will be staged at the Suntec Singapore International Convention & Exhibition Centre in the middle of the thriving city.
Bringing SIGGRAPH to Asia was always going to be a big job and those involved behind the scenes are confident of a very special offering due in Singapore for 2008.
It is no secret that Asian influence in digital arts is rising in quality and technology. Some of the most sensational games and digital characters have come from artists in Japan, Korea, China as well as Singapore. Governments all over Asia are bringing billions of dollars to the table for research and development into digital media. For instance, the Singapore government is actively promoting research and development in interactive digital media and has set aside S$500m for this purpose over the next five years.
While the USA-based SIGGRAPH showed that the number of conference papers from Asia has more than doubled since 2000, deeper studies have shown that people from Asia have generally stayed away because they could not afford the journey across the Pacific or were prevented due to visa restrictions. The landscape is all about to change.
At Boston's SIGGRAPH in 2006, Scott Owen and Alyn Rockwood, the President and Vice President of ACM SIGGRAPH had a meeting with an Asian delegation, and set upon the task of making SIGGRAPH Asia a reality. YT Lee, the Vice Chair of the Singapore Chapter, and Masa Inakage, a founding member of the Tokyo Chapter, presented their bids at the ACM SIGGRAPH Executive Committee meeting. The first event was awarded to Singapore, and YT Lee was also confirmed as the Conference Chair.
If you are venturing in from Europe, the USA, Middle East, Scandinavia, Australia or further north in Asia, Singapore is full of the most amazing sights and activities. First thing to remember is that Singapore is a thriving city, an independent country and an island all in one. Come in early and have a look around. Singapore is one of four remaining true city-states in the world. It is the smallest nation in South East Asia. Singapore has been an independent nation since 1965 and English is the main language spoken. There's a world famous zoo, amazing cultural exhibits and some of the best food in the world.
Sitting 75 miles north of the equator, Singapore in December will probably be a little warm and in that part of the year also is known to have pretty high humidity. Most larger city buildings have air-conditioning but once you are acclimatised, take a stretch out in the jungle of Pulau Ubin, check out the Botanic Gardens, the Singapore Zoo or watch some cricket at the oval. Expect rain most afternoons. Not a quiet drizzle but real drenching rain. If indoors is more your style, visit Raffles Hotel for a 'Singapore Sling', check out the shopping opportunities or gaze around in the Asian History Museum.
Right now, SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 is almost ready, with the conference due to begin December 10 and trade show floor to open on the December 11, running for three days. As it approaches, CGSociety will give an idea of what to expect, what to watch for, who to spot and where to go. During the show, CGSociety will be there to document the sessions and proceedings, to give readers a guided snapshot of the inaugural show.
