Author - Hans Westman,  Editor

A couple of years ago we were in Bridgehampton to celebrate Christmas. The family had been invited to a Christmas Eve party, but the grandson was sick, so he and I ended up staying home. The next morning my wife gave me a card from an artist she had met. It was adorned with an image of an almost ethereal landscape that reminded me of the Dusseldorf School of painting and German Romanticism period. "Oh, a painter." I thought. When we got back to Pittsburgh, I looked up the website address on the card to take a closer look. My assumption was dead wrong. "Wild Flowers" is the title of the piece by artist Kim Keever used for the cover of this issue. If not oils, could it be a piece produced using 2D and 3D software? Think again.

Kim has written a great article entitled "Early Memories, New Perceptions", recapping remembrances from his childhood and the impact it had on his career as an artist. What struck me was the dedication and persistence to follow a calling, even when it strayed from the path of expectations and predictable outcomes.

Scott Draves, a.k.a. "Spot", in collaboration with his wife and partner in arms, Isabel Walcott Draves, has written an article entitled "The Flame Algorithm and Its Open Source Culture", extending us the opportunity to revisit his work, already invisibly familiar to many, as well as his persistence in exploring a perpetual state of discovery, personified by computer art generated through mass participation.

Animation as a rule is the discipline that breaks all rules, yet at times under very disciplined guidelines. Contrary to a clear perception of "the rules", Darrell Van Citters both repels and embraces computer graphics in his written piece "Animation Technology - a Renegade Approach", where he reiterates the role of the artist/animator and that of technology, something that we all are well to be reminded of.

VisFiles returns, this time with an article submitted by VisFiles editor, Kwan-Liu Ma, promoting distance transfer and analysis of large volume data by means of "explorable images" that embody terabytes of raw data in an elegant visual representation.

I came in contact with MK Haley first when she was Communications Director for SIGGRAPH. During her long tenure as a SIGGRAPH volunteer, she has warn many hats and has been a key driving force behind the scenes of the annual SIGGRAPH conference. It is by means of the contributions from volunteers such as MK that ensure we all have a conference to experience every year (remember it's Vancouver in 2011!). In her article, she expresses the importance of getting involved,  sharing with us her journey as an active SIGGRAPH member and how that persistence transitioned into and influenced her career, truly an inspiring story for all.

Dr. Drew Davidson's article sites excerpts from his newly published book Cross-Media Communications: an Introduction to the Art of Creating Integrated Media Experiences, taking up the current trend of cross-media pollination and its influence on public dialog and popular culture. Let the digital community flourish and the wild flowers grow.

Happy reading!

About the Editor:

Hans Westman

has been active as an artist and art educator in both Sweden and the U.S from 1976 on. He discovered animation as an art form in the late ‘70s and started experimenting with animation through the support of Filmverkstan in Stockholm, Sweden. In 1987 he was exposed to "computer manipulated imagery" and has been working with the medium ever since. He is currently the Academic Department Chair for the Media Arts & Animation Department at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh.


Contact information:
email: hans_westman@siggraph.org
Tel: +1 (412) 291-6409