The ACM SIGGRAPH Academy is an honorary group of individuals who have made substantial contributions to the field of computer graphics. These are principal leaders of the field, whose efforts have shaped the disciplines and/or industry, and led the research and/or innovation in computer graphics and interactive techniques. The inaugural class of 2018 was formed from past SIGGRAPH award winners.
Current Recipients
Marc Alexa
Technical University of Berlin
For pioneering contributions in geometry processing, shape modeling, and digital fabrication.
Paolo Cignoni
CNR-ISTI
For contributions in geometry processing and computational fabrication, and for releasing important open-source tools.
Hans-Peter Seidel
Max-Planck-Institut für Informatik
For contributions to spline and mesh processing, and for the impact of his research and mentorship.
Peter Shirley
nVidia
For pioneering contributions in Monte Carlo rendering and real-time ray tracing, and for contributions to graphics education.
Iñigo Quilez
For the development of Shadertoy and other contributions to computer graphics. (Practitioner)
Pol Jeremias
For the development of Shadertoy and other contributions to computer graphics.
2022 ACM SIGGRAPH Practitioner Award
Vera Molnár
For her many pioneering computational art techniques engaging human sensitivity in the production of her abstract geometrical artworks. (Distinguished Artist)
Michiel van de Panne
University of British Columbia
For his fundamental work in computer animation, particularly on the simulation and control of physics-based characters. (Computer Graphics Achievement)
Ed Angel
University of New Mexico, emeritus
For a series of textbooks and courses that introduced a top-down approach to teaching computer graphics that let students create three-dimensional applications early in the course with a standard API. (Distinguished Educator)
Previous Recipients
2021 ACM SIGGRAPH Academy Class
Karen Liu
For the development of simulation-and-control of tasks that require interaction between rigid-body dynamics and complex environments.
Norm Badler
For fundamental contributions to modeling virtual humans and to computer animation, and for educating multiple generations of diverse computer graphics students.
Brent Burley
For his contributions to rendering and production workflows everywhere. (Practitioner)
William Seaman
For his pioneering work ‘Recombinant Poetics / Recombinant Informatics / Neosentience’. (Distinguished Artist)
Doug L. James
For his pioneering work in the simulation of deformable models and in sound rendering. (Computer Graphics Achievement)
Markus Gross
For contributions to point-based graphics, 3D capture and video technology, and physics-based animation, and for founding an influential industrial research laboratory.
Mathieu Desbrun
Caltech
For contributions to geometric processing and establishing the discrete differential geometry framework.
Barbara Mones
University of Washington in Seattle
For the development of curricula in computer animation, and her long-term work in SIGGRAPH education initiatives. (Distinguished Educator)
2020 ACM SIGGRAPH Academy Class
Michael F. Cohen
Coons Award. (Originally inducted in 2018 for the development of practical radiosity methods for realistic image synthesis)
Jeffrey Shaw
For his singular vision and pioneering efforts in the creation of interactive and immersive media art. (Distinguished Artist).
Donald P. Greenberg
For pioneering original ideas, and for education of graduate students in computer graphics and computer-aided design. (Distinguished Educator, first inducted 2018)
Ming Lin
For contributions in collision detection, physics simulation, natural phenomena, crowd animation, haptics, and sound rendering.
Eugene Fiume
For development of physics-based fluid simulation, illumination simulation and character animation, and for advising and mentoring many leading researchers in academia and industry.
Kavita Bala
For fundamental contributions to physically-based and scalable rendering, material modeling, perception for graphics, and visual recognition. (Computer Graphics Achievement)
Alla Sheffer
For contributions in geometry processing and interactive geometric modeling.
Elizabeth Baron
Unity Technologies
For her trailblazing work in bringing virtual environments and related interactive techniques to engineering and design processes in multiple industries. (Practitioner).
Hanspeter Pfister
Harvard University
For diverse contributions to visual computing including data visualization, point-based rendering, 3D scanning and physical fabrication.
2019 ACM SIGGRAPH Academy Class
Stephen Hill
For implementing multiple advanced real-time techniques in various games and virtual reality experiences, and for leadership in sharing ideas with the rendering community. (Practitioner).
Donna Cox
For pioneering work in the art of scientific data visualization. (Distinguished Artist).
Andries van Dam
(Distinguished Educator)
Denis Zorin
For fundamental contributions that have advanced the fields of geometry processing, multiresolution shape modeling, and geometric principles of physics-based simulation in graphics. (Computer Graphics Achievement)
Hanan Samet
For founding, developing, and authoring the definitive texts in the field of storing, processing, analyzing, and retrieving spatial data.
Ravi Ramamoorthi
For groundbreaking theoretical work in mathematical representations of visual appearance, and for translating these into computational methods with wide practical impact.
Dinesh Manocha
For contributions to geometric modeling, GPU computing, interactive rendering of large complex scenes, and interactive sound simulation.
Frederick Brooks
For pioneering work applying scientific rigor to virtual reality, and applying virtual reality to scientific research.
Marie-Paule Cani
For contributions in implicit surfaces, physical simulation, sketch-based interaction, and expressive modeling, and for leadership in the graphics community.
2018 ACM SIGGRAPH Academy Class
Ramesh Raskar
For numerous, impactful research contributions to computational imaging and light transport.
Fredo Durand
For seminal contributions to the field of computational photography.
Richard Szeliski
For pioneering contributions at the intersection of computer graphics and computer vision, particularly in image-based modeling and rendering.
Michael Kass
For significant contributions to computer graphics, ranging from image processing to animation to modeling, and in particular for the introduction of optimization techniques as a fundamental tool in graphics.
Greg Ward
For the development of the Radiance synthetic imaging system.
Thomas W. Sederberg
For pioneering work on free-form deformations, and the use of algebraic geometry in geometry modeling.
Jos Stam
For pioneering work on subdivision surfaces, and on fast algorithms for the simulation of natural phenomena, especially fire, fluids, and gasses.
David Kirk
For bringing high performance computer graphics systems to the mass market.
Tony DeRose
For seminal work in making subdivision surfaces a practical geometric modeling technique.
Przemyslaw Prusinkiewicz
For work in the modeling and visualizing of biological structures.
Marc Levoy
For pioneering work in rendering volumes without an intermediate surface representation.
Alvy Ray Smith
For seminal contributions to computer paint systems.
John Warnock
For PostScript, which embodies a major contribution to imaging models, and to integration of graphics and text.
Alan H. Barr
For contributions to graphics, primarily for extending computer graphics shape modeling to include physically based and teleological modeling.
Loren Carpenter
For pioneering work in the design of algorithms for generating raster computer graphics, and for computer graphic images that mimic photographic realism.
Criteria for Election to the ACM SIGGRAPH Academy
- Cumulative contributions to the field of computer graphics and interactive techniques
- Impact on the field through development of new research directions and/or innovations
- Influence on the work of others
- Reasonably active participant in the ACM SIGGRAPH community
- All accomplished members of the ACM SIGGRAPH community will be eligible to be nominated including researchers, practitioners, technologists, artists, designers, and educators.
Nomination Procedure
ACM SIGGRAPH Academy members are selected by a ACM SIGGRAPH Academy Committee consisting of five voting members from across the SIGGRAPH community. Nominations for the ACM SIGGRAPH Academy may be submitted by contacting the SIGGRAPH Academy Chair before 31 January each year.
Requirements
- A brief summary (in English, maximum one page) explaining how the nominee meets the criteria
- Supporting letters of exactly three endorsers. Endorsers should themselves have achieved distinction in the field. Endorsers will need to have personal knowledge of the candidate’s work. Endorsers will provide a brief endorsement statement giving their personal assessment of the candidate’s impact on the field.
- Nominator’s name, address, telephone number, and email address.