The
SEMAPHORE
ACCAD Alumni Newsletter
January 2006
The
Ohio State University
The
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CSURI RETROSPECTIVE at SIGGRAPH 2006Dear ACCADians... we are thrilled to send news that a retrospective of Chuck Csuri's life work is being planned for SIGGRAPH 2006. SIGGRAPH will be held July 30 to August 3 in Boston.Preliminary meetings about the retrospective have begun. SIGGRAPH committed to cover costs related to the on-site installation, catalog, etc. However, there will be significant additional expense to frame and ship Chuck's artwork to Boston. For the exhibit to succeed, there is need for additional financial support. A fund raising initiative will begin in the near future. If you are interested in contributing to the retrospective, please contact Maria. Thanks for your consideration and we hope to see many of you in Boston this year! |
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In support of ACCAD's "Digital Animation ~ A Mentoring Program for Young Women", Fifth Third Bank has allocated $7,000. Digital Animation is a free summer program for 8th and 9th grade girls. Each year the program selects fifteen young women with exhibited artistic potential. During the program, these girls work in groups with ACCAD's female graduate students who are studying computer graphics technologies at The Ohio State University. For two weeks, mentors provide instruction and leadership. They assist with problem-solving and collaborative learning to create digital animations. On the last day of the program, each group presents their final animation to delighted family and friends. Past animations have focused on understanding: "Wetlands", "Prairies", "Rivers and Streams". |
WELCOME to Alan PriceACCAD is pleased to welcome new Associate Professor, Alan Price. Prior to joining ACCAD and the Department of Design, Alan was an Associate Professor in the Visual Arts Department at UMBC (University of Maryland, Baltimore County).Professor Price teaches animation and directs research in the areas of visualization and immersive environment technologies. This autumn 2005, Alan taught a new course on MEL scripting, a topic often requested by ACCAD students. |
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| His independent animation work has received awards and appears in numerous international festivals including: Transmediale Berlin, Black Maria US, Anima Mundi Brazil, Festival Arcipelgo Italy, Clermont-Ferrand France, Melbourne, Holland and SIGGRAPH. He has presented his research at conferences such as SIGGRAPH, ICHIM, Ecole du Louvre, Paris, and Information Visualization, London. Productions he has designed and directed appear in nationally broadcast programming, BBC, and permanent exhibits such as the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum in Chicago. |
Landing/Place ~ the performance2 years.... Bebe Miller.....motion capture....Brian......dancers...Vita.......images.... light....projection.....scrims.....stage.....rhythm....drums.....breeze.....lemons.....
To see and read more about the innovative Motion Capture images click here. |
Landing/Place ~ the reviewsLanding Place performed in several locations this year: College Park, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Cleveland and several other venues. Below are links to recent reviews.Bebe Miller by Sarah Kaufman, Washington Post, September 11, 2005 Dance Troupe Bends High-Tech Into an Art Form by Sandra Guy, Chicago Sun Times, October 5, 2005 Going On ~ the boldly searching impermanence of being by Deborah Jowitt, of The Village Voice, Dance Theater Workshop, October 12-15, 2005 |
JANE Exhibit at the Burpee Museum of Natural HistoryOn June 29, 2005 the Burpee Museum of Natural History unveiled to the public their latest exhibit "Jane: Diary of a Dinosaur".
The following students and staff worked on the Burpee Museum collaboration:
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New and Recent Audiences for JANE ACCAD’s work for the Jane exhibit was recently featured in a pre-game brunch, prior to the Iowa vs. OSU football game . This was hosted by the President of The Ohio State University, Karen Holbrook, on September 24. Shana Burns, Cara Christeson and Maria Palazzi presented. On December 1st, Maria Palazzi and the Burpee Museum presented JANE to a world wide audience via the Megaconference, a web-based conference hosted via Interent2 technologies. |
SUPER VISION opened in Columbus at the Wexner Center for the Arts on November 2nd and continued through November 6, 2005. ACCAD and The Wexner Center were lead co-producers on this project. ACCAD's Brian Windsor provided Motion Capture services for the Builders Association/dbox (TBA/dbox) while they were in residence at the Wexner. Motion Capture was an ongoing process throughout their stay. Facial, hand, and full body capture were performed by participants of varying ages. TBA/dbox then incorporated clips of the MoCap data into final effects for SUPER VISION. The Builders Association is a New York-based performance and media company that exploits the richness of contemporary technologies to extend the boundaries of theater. This newest project, SUPER VISION, explored the ambiguous and changing nature of our relationship to living in a post-private society, where personal electronic information is constantly collected and distributed. For more information on Builders Association see: http://www.thebuildersassociation.org/ |
ACCAD INTERNSELECTRONIC ARTS ~ Brent Zorich (MFA candidate, Design) was an intern at Electronic Arts this past autumn quarter, then returned winter quarter to finish his thesis work. Of the internship, Brent says...."The internship at Electronic Arts was an amazing experience. While there, I created two character rigs for the main bad guys in the game, 'Superman Returns'. In addition I created a tremendous amount of citizen characters as well as modeled the wardrobe of the main villain in the game 'Lex Luther'. I learned an incredible amount about modeling with ZBrush, as well as creating rigs to be used for anatomically correct characters. I definitely recommend the internship for all students."DISNEY FEATURE ANIMATION ~ Shana Burns (MFA candidate, Design) completed an internship at Disney Feature Animation this past summer. Her internship was with the Disney "Look Development" department and ran from June 20 to August 12, 2005. In Shana's words....."We learned how the painter fits into the Walt Disney Feature Animation pipeline. We also learned about painting successful texture maps, and how to paint them efficiently. We were trained in Disney's proprietary software, as well as advanced Photoshop, traditional painting and life drawing. There were also film screenings and dailies of films currently in progress" Shana's adds,...."I would highly recommend this internship for anyone interested in texture painting or in a TD position related to texturing." |
Staff NewsVita Berezina-Blackburn Vita says, Hi all, our daughter Iris was born on October 2nd at OSU Medical Center. She is now almost 4 months old and loves to smile, chat in her own language, listen to music, and move her legs VERY very quickly. She doesn't like broccoli and tangerines that mom dares to sneak into her breastfeeding diet, also hates Stravinsky! She keeps her mom, dad and grandma constantly busy, tired and extremely happy! Happy Holidays and much love to all of you! ~ Vita"
Vita has returned full time to ACCAD as of January 2006. She is teaching Arts College 751, Form Visualization and continuing to work on several collaborations. Peter Gerstmann Peter and his wife Lucia are expecting their first child this spring 2006. Peter has been a part-time instructor for ACCAD since 2001, but will be taking a break this winter in preparation for the baby. We wish them all the best! Peter currently works full time for Netscape in Columbus, Ohio. Matt Lewis
Maria Palazzi Maria has been invited to be a panelist for the 2006 Lawrence and Isabel Barnett Symposium on May 4-6 at OSU. This year's symposium is entitled, "Creative Enterprise and Public Value: From Ideas to Action". She will participate in the panel, "New Media Across the Arts." Glen Shere Ohio State University's Office of Information Technology has requested that ACCAD retire the use of "cgrg.ohio-state.edu"
for e-mail and WWW. Brian Windsor Brian collaborated on several long term and robust projects this year by incorporating Motion Capture technology. Projects included "Landing/Place" and "Super Vision" (see articles). He is also participating in completion of the JANE project. |
Alumni Updates
Additional alumni sightings in.....
Steve Anderson (1987) left Electronic Arts about eight months ago to work with MFORMA, a startup in mobile media space. Steve and family have moved back to the San Francisco Bay area. Bradd Birmingham (2004) married this past June, honeymooned in Hawaii, moved to New Albany, Ohio and recently co-founded a company named Fuse Studios. The company is located in the Columbus Arena District and provides high-end three dimensional computer representations for clients ranging from large commercial developers to small architectural firms. Tim Daoust (2004) moved to the United Kingdom after graduating with his M.S. in Computer Science and Engineering. Tim lives in Oxford, England and is working for NaturalMotion, developing animation software. Tim says, "I still get to play around with motion capture, Maya, and lots of proprietary technology! I have been having a lot of fun exploring England and Europe. Hopefully, I will get a chance to see everyone at SIGGRAPH next year." He did fly back to the U.S. for Thanksgiving. Tim said drop him a line if you're ever in the area daoustt@yahoo.com... :-). Kevin Geiger (1994) CG Supervisor at Walt Disney Feature Animation, recently gave a presentation at The 2005 International Forum for digital Media Art in Taipei entitled, "21st Century Squash& Stretch: Classic Animation Principles Redefined on Walt Disney's 'Chicken Little'". Carol Gigliotti (1993) has been actively publishing and speaking. November 14th she spoke at the new UCLA ART/SCI center about the recent "Special Issue of AI and Society". Carol guest edited on "Genetic Technologies and Animals". Information about this event and the live (now archived) streaming video can be viewed at: http://www.design.ucla.edu/events/calendar.php?ID=388. The journal issue is slated to be out in print form in January 2006, but the entire issue is now available on-line at: http://www.eciad.bc.ca/~gigliott/gtanimal also see: http://www.carolgigliotti.net. Tim Glenn (1999) continues his work in dance technology as Assistant Professor of Dance at Florida State University. Research activities this fall include: the world premiere of Aqueous Myth: Tales of a Water Planet www.aqueousMyth.com; a residency at Girls Preparatory School in Chattanooga; workshops in video dance for Booker High School and Girls, Inc. in Sarasota; and a presentation at Marymount Manhattan College called "Idea, Process, Product: Considerations for the Choreographic Journey". In January 2006, Tim will be presenting his research in concert dance documentation at the Hawaii International Conference for the Arts and Humanities. Muqeem Khan (1996) just moved to Virginia Commonwealth University - at Qatar - as an Assistant Professor in the Communication Design Department. Muqeem wrote, "Just across from VCU are Texas A&M, Cornell and Carnegie Mellon. It is an interesting set up where you see all of these great institutions and interact with them academically. If you are in the region or visiting, do contact me. Regards, Muqeem." moki2@usa.net.
Katie Lynch (2005) recently completed a residency at the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, Vermont. She is settling into Los Angeles, looking for work and studio space. She is connected to a community learning center nearby where she hopes to teach Flash and Dreamweaver starting this spring. New e-mail: klynch.art@gmail.com Neal McDonald (1998) is an Art Professor and Program Chair of Computer Art at the University of Saint Francis. Neal and his wife have two children Ella and Henry.
Torsten Möller (1999) says, "I got tenure...news that I'm happy to report! Everything else is in constant chaos though :-)." Torsten is a faculty member at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby Canada. http://www.cs.sfu.ca/~torsten/ Keith Ruston.. has finished his Computer Science and Engineering school work, but is completing his final thesis. In the last 3 months, he got married, moved to Orlando, FL and started a new job as a Software Engineer with Electronic Arts (Tiburon)... see alumni group shot above! Keith is on the 'Tools Team' working on Xbox 360 and PS3 games. Marla Schweppe (1984) is now Chair of the Digital Studio at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT). Son Devin is a junior at Williams College studying chemistry. Clarke Stallworth (2001) is living in Atlanta, GA....just bought a house, is in his first semester of Law school at Georgia State, working hard and doing fine. His goal is to go into poverty law or public interest law of some sort. |
RECENT GRADUATES Heather Caprette , MFA, Design, Spring 2005 Shawn Hove , MFA, Dance, Summer 2005 Keith Kelley , MFA, Design, Spring 2005
Kap-Dae Lim , MFA, Design, Summer 2005.
Katie Lynch , MFA, Art, Summer 2005
Scott Shelton , MFA, Art, Spring 2005
Todd Swepston , MFA, Art and Technology, Summer 2005.
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ACCAD is a teaching and research center in computer visualization and digital animation at The Ohio State University |
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