Los Angeles - SIGGRAPH 2015

Dear Friends:

This week, I'm in sunny Los Angeles, California.  The weather here is so much nicer than back in Austin, as it actually cools in the evening when the sun goes down.  I'm here at another industry conference.  This one is called SIGGRAPH (short for Special Interest Group on GRAPHics and Interactive Techniques).  Basically, it started as a purely academic conference on computer graphics, but has morphed into anything around graphics - video games, special effects, animation, etc.

I'm staying in downtown LA, at the Westin Bonaventure Hotel.  I haven't stayed here for about 15 years - back when I worked for Sega.  

This is a famous hotel, as it has been used in quite a few films.  The exterior looks very futuristic.  Here's what the lobby looks like now:

Films that were made here include Interstellar, In the Line of Fire, True Lies, Heat and many, many more.

At the conference, there are technical exhibits and artistic displays.  This is actually a combination of both - a giant sculpture of a skull, with over 40 animated projections inside.  Watch the video below, as it changes the images.

In another area, a company had created a 360-degree projection system inside this small dome.  They played a series of relaxing graphical images, set to music.  I almost fell asleep in here...

On the show floor, there were several companies that were selling "motion capture" systems.  Basically, this would take real actors and record their movements, so that animated characters would "move" like real people.  The sports video games use this all the time.  This is a system that provides the digital information while two men are playing a game of basketball.  The monitors overhead show what their actions would look like in a video game.  See the video for a clearer idea:

Another area that is interesting, is where you film an actor making facial expressions, and then recording that onto a digital character in real-time.  This takes a lot of computing power to make it happen at the exact same time:

The rest of the trade show is pretty normal stuff for any tech conference.  Rows and rows of booths with interesting things to see and learn:

The Pixar booth was handing out a little figure to attendees.  By the time I realized what was happening, the line had extended several hundred feet around the show:

Virtual reality (VR) is a hot topic right now.  Usually, this involves putting on a set of goggles and watching a virtual environment fill your entire view.  There is also another interesting category called augmented reality (AR).  This is where a video feed is taken from a camera, phone or tablet - and graphical images are placed on top of that feed.  Think of pointing your phone at a building, and having lots of information pop-up about the business inside.  In a neat twist, there was an application that would take your facial image and place make-up on it - this was no ordinary make-up.  It was used to promote a zombie TV show.  You were either a survivor (top image), or one of the zombies (bottom image).  The video shows the real power, as it makes the changes in real-time:

In another part of the image capture area, they were showing rigs that are used to record actor's performances.  Much like the way they recorded the actor that played Gollum in the Lord of the Rings movies:

I can't imagine walking around with that thing on your head all day...

That's it for now.  Lots of interesting things to see.  I spent the rest of the time in meetings with companies, talking about ways to improve their graphics on mobile phones and tablets.  I can see why people love this show...but I don't think I will return next year.  Meanwhile, I await the arrival of my family to LA for some FUN!  Check back soon...