FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
10 June 2002

For further information:
Sheila Hoffmeyer/Ann Kilhoffer
+1.312.644.6610 x5811
+1.312.245.1083 fax
media-s2002@siggraph.org
 
SIGGRAPH 2002 ANNOUNCES NEW WEB GRAPHICS PROGRAM
Program Teaches Content Creators How Talent Can Cross Over to the Web
 
Conference: 21-26 July 2002
Exhibition: 23-25 July 2002

Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center
San Antonio, Texas USA

(Chicago, IL) -- ACM SIGGRAPH today announced the new Web Graphics program for SIGGRAPH 2002, the 29th International Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques, being held 21-26 July 2002 at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center, San Antonio, Texas. The Web Graphics program is designed to teach animators, artists, educators, and engineers how their talent can cross over to the Web.

"There's a growing demand for complex graphics content on the Web and the SIGGRAPH audience is perfectly poised to meet this demand," said Simon Allardice, SIGGRAPH 2002 Web Graphics Chair from clingfish.com. "The SIGGRAPH Web Graphics program will teach techniques for developing graphics for the Web so that attendees can take advantage of the Web's artistic, commercial, and personal potential."

The Web Graphics program has 34 sessions presented by speakers from 13 countries. The sessions are divided in 12 categories: Images, Art & Design, Applications, Content Creation, Animation, Collaboration, Frontiers, Compression, Standards, Audio, Experimental Browsing Spaces, and Games & Communities.

WEB GRAPHICS PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS:

Adaptive Solid Texturing for Web Graphics
Bing-Yu Chen and Tomoyuki Nishita, The University of Tokyo
A proposed method for rendering objects with solid texturing for Web graphics. Although the implementation uses only Java, users can also achieve an almost-real-time interactive response.

EventScope: Discovering Mars With Internet-Based Virtual Environments
Peter Coppin, Karl Fischer, Natalie Koch, Dana Martinelli, W. Ronald McCloskey, and Michael Wagner, Carnegie Mellon University
A telepresence interface through which students explore Mars. EventScope's 3D virtual environments are seamlessly integrated with a standards-based curriculum downloaded to classroom computers.

The Evolution of Animation: BedRock Revisited
Sandro Corsaro, Sandro Corsaro Animation
A comparison of television animation from the 1950s to the Web animation in the 1990s, including how the future economy of television animation will rely heavily on its storied past.

Flash MX Live: Real-Time Video and Audio Delivery in Multi-User Environments
Robert Reinhardt, [theMAKERS]
The new real-time video and audio capabilities of Macromedia's Flash Player 6 plug-in for Web browsers. Deconstruction of a chat application that enables several listeners to hear and see a discussion between a host and any given listener in the group. The new technology is presented with an analysis of two main aspects of Internet communication:

• The differences between one-on-one messaging and group discussion environments.
• The dynamics of audio and video "space" compared to a text-based LAN

Interactive 3D Characters for Web-Based Learning and Accessibility
Ed Sims, Vcom3D, Inc.
A character-animation authoring system developed for educators who have no previous animation experience. Applications created by educators using the authoring system, including sign-language interpretation of stories for young deaf readers, job interview skills training, and counseling skills training.

Pseudo-3D Photo Collage
Hiroya Tanaka, Masatoshi Arikawa, and Ryosuke Shibasaki, The University of Tokyo
A new method for using photographs to create virtual walkthroughs on the Web.

The Reality Cluster
Branden Hall and Samuel Wan, Fig Leaf Software/Samuelwan.com
A multi-user system that provides users with both focus and context in navigating relationships between multiple nodes of information: real-time audio-video conferencing, video recording, audio recording, text recording, and real-time interaction among multiple clients.

Scalable Vector Graphics
Dean Jackson, World Wide Web Consortium
Scalable Vector Graphics, a language for describing two-dimensional graphics and animation in XML, is the Web standard developed by the World Wide Web Consortium.

SMIL: An Introduction
Philipp Hoschka,World Wide Web Consortium/INRIA
The SMIL language enables interactive audio-visual multimedia for the Web. This summary of its key features explains some of the key insights into the Web-language design that influenced SMIL's development.

The Xj3D Browser: Community-Based 3D Software Development
Alan Hudson, Yumetech, Inc.
This presentation outlines the technical and organizational issues surrounding the community development process of the Xj3D browser. It is an open source API for developing X3D and VRML 97 applications.

SIGGRAPH 2002 registration information can be found at www.siggraph.org/s2002/registration
or by contacting SIGGRAPH 2002 Conference Management
401 North Michigan Avenue
Chicago, Illinois 60611 USA
+1.312.321.6830 phone
+1.312.321.6876 fax
registration@siggraph.org.