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The thirtieth meeting of the Prague computer science seminar

Jaroslav Křivánek

Realistic rendering in computer graphics: From nuclear reactors to pretty pictures on the silver screen and handsome 3D prints

Computer generated images have become a natural part of our lives. We encounter them in animated films, cinematic special effects, advertisements, architectural and product visualizations, computer games, etc.

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October 19, 2017

4:00pm

Auditorium E-301, FEL CTU
Karlovo nám. 13, Praha 2
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Computer generated images have become a natural part of our lives. We encounter them in animated films, cinematic special effects, advertisements, architectural and product visualizations, computer games, etc. At the same time, 3D printing technology is maturing and enables producing prints using various materials with a wide range of appearances. In this talk, I summarize some of my results in the area of computational approaches for generating photorealistic images and controlling appearance of 3D prints.

I show that these two seemingly different topics share the same basis: accurate simulation of the behavior of light in various environments. Origins of this computational problem can be traced back to the development of first nuclear weapons in the Manhattan project, and to names like von Neumann, Fermi, or Ulam. Modern light transport simulation algorithms are, among others, responsible for the incessant advances in the visual quality of blockbusters produced by studios such as Pixar, Disney, and Weta Digital.

Jaroslav Křivánek

Jaroslav Křivánek is an associate professor of Computer Science at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics of Charles University, Prague, and a co-founder of and the Chief Science Officer at Render Legion, a company behind the realistic rendering software Corona Renderer. Previously, he was a Marie Curie research fellow at Cornell University and a researcher at the University of Central Florida, he worked as a consultant for Disney Research Zurich, Weta Digital and Sony Pictures Imageworks, and as an associate professor and researcher at Czech Technical University in Prague. Jaroslav received his Ph.D. from INRIA Rennes. His primary research interest is in computer graphics, with focus on realistic rendering, light transport simulation, and Monte Carlo methods. The technologies he has co-developed are employed, among others, by Weta Digital, Pixar Animation Studios, and many others. In 2014, Jaroslav was selected for the New Europe 100 list, “a list of outstanding challengers who are leading world-class innovation from Central and Eastern Europe”.

Its program consists of a one-hour lecture followed by a discussion. The lecture is based on an (internationally) exceptional or remarkable achievement of the lecturer, presented in a way which is comprehensible and interesting to a broad computer science community. The lectures are in English.

The seminar is organized by the organizational committee consisting of Roman Barták (Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics), Jaroslav Hlinka (Czech Academy of Sciences, Computer Science Institute), Michal Chytil, Pavel Kordík (CTU in Prague, Faculty of Information Technologies), Michal Koucký (Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics), Jan Kybic (CTU in Prague, Faculty of Electrical Engineering), Michal Pěchouček (CTU in Prague, Faculty of Electrical Engineering), Jiří Sgall (Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics), Vojtěch Svátek (University of Economics, Faculty of Informatics and Statistics), Michal Šorel (Czech Academy of Sciences, Institute of Information Theory and Automation), Tomáš Werner (CTU in Prague, Faculty of Electrical Engineering), and Filip Železný (CTU in Prague, Faculty of Electrical Engineering)

The idea to organize this seminar emerged in discussions of the representatives of several research institutes on how to avoid the undesired fragmentation of the Czech computer science community.