Greetings,

I was wondering what others on this list who attended SIGGRAPH thought
of this year's conference?
Any surprises? Disappointments?
Here's a few of my thoughts and observations …

San Diego …
What a pleasant town for SIGGRAPH, lots of happy smiling people! For
me, this was by far the most laid back and generally cool SIGGRAPH I've
ever attended, and it seemed that San Diego had a lot to do with
contributing to that vibe. The convention center is right on the
waterfront and it was really nice to be able to take a break from the
conference and watch the sailboats, and lots of people at the
Embarcadaro and marina enjoying life… it was so nice…

The SESI/Houdini meeting
Great to finally meet many people I've only talked to via phone and
email!
Some notes
1) No mention of CFD in Houdini This is surprising seeing how fluid
dynamics are showing up in so many places. There was a brief mention
that “the dynamics would in one place” in future versions of Houdini, or
something like that, I'm not sure.
2) No free HDK Darn … would have been a great thing to announce at
the meeting!
3) Still no Houdini book Why …? Yet more titles appearing for Maya,
Softimage, Max, etc., yet not a single book for Houdini.
4) Call for Houdini talent Holy crap! It seems the demand for Houdini
artists has doubled, tripled, or more … Good news!
5) The Inflate and Pelt SOP neat stuff for sure.
6) Congratulations to the Apprentice winners! Good work!

Houdini reception
Lot's of interesting conversations and excitement, a few fleeting
glimpses of people, some I didn't have a chance to talk with and wanted
to; please email. The number of schools teaching Houdini continues to
dwindle, yet the demand for Houdini artists continues to grow ..
puzzling. Oh, and T-shirts too! -)

Real Flow
Wow! That was a busy booth! Nice demo, and lots of interest. Very
promising young company. Sure wish Real Flow was procedural though.
They've got a new RBD engine that's really impressive, it's in version
2.5 which will be released in September, can't wait!

The job board
Oh how depressing … the ratio of job postings vs. resumes must have
been 120, or worse … that was the only place I saw really worried
faces …

No SGI!
There was no SGI booth … I was astonished … could they really be
gone forever … damn.

Cg
Mega cool stuff! I took a couple of classes, looks really promising
especially for the future of gaming and real-time gfx.

H/W algorithms
Mark Elendt paneled a very interesting and informative “Sketch &
Application” on H/W algorithms! The MIPS mapped texture talk was an eye
opener and Ian Stephenson's talk about RenderMan on the PS2 was a gas!
Grinning from ear to ear I was!

Fluids and level sets
Another really interesting Sketch, neat techniques and solutions for an
interesting set of problems.

Water, water, everywhere …
Another Sketch on fluids and water in production Asked why they used
Maya for the particle effects on Sinbad (they used the Calypso plugin
for Maya before Maya 5 came along) and not Houdini … the answer was,
“that's what I knew” … oh, OK.

Scientific and medical visualization …
A panel talking about the many areas of CG applications *outside* of the
entertainment world, very refreshing and interesting indeed! Certainly
a growing and alternative career path for CG artists.

The Art Gallery was all over the convention center instead of being
confined to a single room, very nice, art everywhere! The HDRI
display(s) in the Emerging Technologies area was really cool, so was the
“fog display”, a stream of water vapor that had an image projected onto
it, groovy. And it seemed the Guerilla Studio was always really busy.

Next year, Synaesthesia in LA … I'm there!

Comments?


–Mark