Digital canvas: artists and designers in the 2D/3D marketplace
Authors: Carpenter R. , Derry J. , Barry C. , Conn P. , Sorensen V. 
Published: November 2005

I'm Rachel Carpenter, and this mike seems to be really alive.The
films that you've been watching on the screen are from the
Animation Screening Room, which is really hot this year. We've got
a lot of wonderful pieces. It's in the Sheraton, just as you walk
in from the Hines, and you'll see signs there. There are three
viewing environments. Right at the beginning, there is a cafe
environment where you can sit down with food and just watch things.
There's a room next to it with monitors and then there's a large
room with rear projection, large screen, lots of seats. There are
schedules available. At any time you can watch two different
things.
I decided to put this panel together when I was working at a
computer graphics school for artists and designers. People were
always asking, "Well, where are the jobs? What kind of work is
there, and why should I bother with computers?" So I got these
people together who have been in the business, in various aspects,
for many years, and have found their own way. They will tell you
their stories and give you an idea of how to look for things.
There are some very specific ideas. Other people seem to have
been having the same thoughts because the education committee put
together this wonderful Volume 23, Careers Handbook, and I suggest
that you get it. It's in the education booth as you come into the
Hines, there are all those booths --- well, the one on the end,
toward the entrance, is called Space, they have up the student
artwork. Volume 23 has categories of different kinds of jobs,
career profiles, colleges and universities which are organized by
topic first, if it's art and design or engineering or other types
of signs or medical or whatever, and then by state.
Then they have about the job search process. There's also a
questionnaire at the end, which the people who put this together
really urge everyone to fill out the questionnaire and send it in.
It's a tremendous amount of information. They are available at the
booth or you can call up ACM and order one. It's Volume 23.
I also want to tell you about another really good opportunity
for artists. I happen to be the United States Representative for
Prix Ars Electronica; it's a competition in Austria for computer
art, animation &amp; music. They have significant cash prizes.
So if you're interested in entering that after this is over, give
me your address and I'll see that you get entry forms for that. You
can also call me in California at 415-892-8254.
Also, you've seen a lot of things while you've been here at
SIGGRAPH and I want to let you know that everybody can participate.
I started going to SIGGRAPH in 1980 when it was in Seattle.
I'm not sure quite how many people were there then, but it was
probably something like 17,000, and when I was SIGGRAPH '85 Art
Show administrator in San Francisco, there were 27,000 people
attending the conference. It keeps on growing because people are
interested and because the industry is growing. You can contribute
too. If you have an idea, write it up, present it as a course,
panel or submit to someone on the committee.
The Animation Screening Room shows works representative of what
is going on in computer graphics, over 50% of the work in there is
science related. Some of that's medical, some engineering, geology,
molecular modeling --- various things. The are lists there; you can
look and see types of job categories.
A large group is composed of works that could be considered
commercial production. Architecture, art and character animation
form a smaller amount of what is being produced in computer
graphics. So search out those other areas. There are many fields
out there. This handbook will help you and we hope you get some
ideas from our panelists.
The amount of material in the Screening Room is about 8-1/2
hours. It's taken a lot of work to put that together. There were 21
hours of work submitted to the film show jury and all of that had
to be gone through many times.
I want to let you know also that afterwards we have a breakout
room for people who want to get together. I know we have a lot of
artists and designers here, besides the panelists, and there may be
some of you who are looking for --- maybe you have jobs for people
or maybe you're just interested in listening. So we will find out
where that breakout room is going to be and I'll tell you at the
end.
<b>A:</b> J as in Jones.
<b>CARPENTER:</b> Okay, the breakout room is going
to be in J Room --- as in H, I, J, K. J. Tonight there is going to
be a reception at the Computer Museum and buses are leaving from
the Hines at 5:00, 5:30 and 6:00, and there's no video or audio
taping of this, and there we've got that. Okay.
The way we're going to do this is John Derry will speak next and
then all our other panelists will speak and then we'll have
questions. So you need to sort of keep track of your questions.
John has a BFA in Painting and Drawing from the University of
Nebraska at Omaha and a MFA in Painting from Cranbrook Academy of
Art in Michigan. He has been involved in computer graphics since
1982. John has found exciting ways to combine traditional methods
with computer graphics to create pieces unique to both worlds. He
feels that the public has become so visually aware that the static
image has to have more excitement in it to compete with the many
moving images that people see each day. Derry enjoys each new
project and approaches it as a creative challenge. He works in the
areas of fine art and pre-press.