OK, you know that you're at a pretty geeky event, when there's a model X-Wing Starfighter at the entrance to the show. And you're at the ultimate geeky event when the X-Wing Starfighter came from George Lucas and was one of the actual models used in the movie.
And that's how you enetered SIGGRAPH 2005! And in many ways, the conference didn't disappoint. Five days worth of panel, discussions, exhibits and experiments. And George Lucas as the keynote speaker!
According to the official information, SIGGRAPH 05 attracted 29,122 artists, research scientists, developers, and academics from 81 countries to Los Angeles this week. More than 250 companies exhibited, including 65 for the first time, covering more than 70,000 net square feet of space. Here's what the official release had to say about the George Lucas keynote:
Breaking new ground this year, the SIGGRAPH 2005 keynote event featured George Lucas in an interview format. In the revealing dialogue, Lucas, who is lauded as the father of digital cinema and internationally known for visionary cinematic feats such as "Star Wars" and "Indiana Jones," explained, "I am a storyteller at heart."Looking to the future, Lucas expressed his belief that advancements in artificial intelligence will vastly change technology and particularly the game industry. "I want to get to the point where you can talk to a game and the game will talk back." Lucas discussed his plans for Lucasfilm to head more into the television arena, and commented that unlike industry visionary Walt Disney, he does not plan to expand his Industrial Light & Magic effects shop into a film studio.
"This is the first group I could come to that didn't ask me what digital arts are." commented Lucas on his 1984 visit to SIGGRAPH. Explaining to the audience that he is not a computer person, Lucas stressed that his quest for innovation was a quest for immaculate reality, "How do we make this real? How do we get immaculate reality?" Looking to the thousands of SIGGRAPH faces before him, Lucas smiled and stated, "I don't care how you do it, I am just glad you are doing it."
SIGGRAPH 2006, the 33rd International Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques, will be held in the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, 30 July - 3 August 2006.
Look for more throughout the weekend!