SIGGRAPH - Overview

Overview

Some highlights of the conference are its Animation Theater and Electronic Theater presentations, where recently created CG films are played. There is a large exhibition floor, where several hundred companies set up elaborate booths and compete for attention and recruits. Most of the companies are in the engineering, graphics, motion picture, or video game industries. There are also many booths for schools which specialize in computer graphics or interactivity.

Dozens of research papers are presented each year, and SIGGRAPH is widely considered the most prestigious forum for the publication of computer graphics research. The recent paper acceptance rate for SIGGRAPH has been less than 20%. The papers accepted for presentation at SIGGRAPH are currently printed in a special issue of the ACM Transactions on Graphics journal. Prior to 2002, SIGGRAPH papers were printed in the SIGGRAPH Conference Proceedings series of publications.

In addition to the papers, there are numerous panels of industry experts set up to discuss a wide variety of topics, from computer graphics to machine interactivity to education. SIGGRAPH also offers many full- and half-day courses in state-of-the-art computer graphics topics, as well as shorter "sketch" presentations where artists and researchers discuss their latest work.

In 1984, under LucasFilm Computer Group, John Lasseter's first computer animated short, The Adventures of André & Wally B., premiered at SIGGRAPH. Pixar's first computer animated short, Luxo, Jr. debuted in 1986. Pixar has debuted numerous shorts at the conference since.

SIGGRAPH has several awards programs to recognize outstanding contributions to computer graphics. The most prestigious is the Steven Anson Coons Award for Outstanding Creative Contributions to Computer Graphics. It has been awarded every two years since 1983 to recognize an individual's lifetime achievement in computer graphics.

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