Lincoln Wallen, chief technology officer of DreamWorks Animation, will discuss “The Technology of Animation” at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday. To purchase tickets, click here using a desktop or laptop computer.
Lincoln Wallen, chief technology officer of DreamWorks Animation, will start the 2015 ATEC Distinguished Lecture Series with a talk titled “The Technology of Animation” at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday. The talk is presented by the Ann and Jack Graves Charitable Foundation.
Wallen’s talk will provide a view into the innovations over the course of DreamWorks Animation’s 20 years that have led to improvements in key tools for animation.
“I will discuss the transformative impact that parallel computing has had on the complex and varied workflows in animation, enabling individual artists to produce more intense character emotions while efficiently scaling asset creation across a multitude of images that make a computer-generated (CG) animated movie,” Wallen said.
Wallen joined DreamWorks Animation in 2008 as head of research and development, overseeing the creation and deployment of the studio’s computer-generated production platform and software tools. Under Wallen’s leadership, DreamWorks Animation was named to MIT Technology Review’s “50 Most Innovative Companies” list.
“Every day at DreamWorks Animation presents different challenges. We have 10 movies in production at any given time, and each movie is similar to building a completely new product each time with different requirements,” Wallen said. “I work with senior leadership to align these requirements using technological innovation to enable our creative teams to be more creative, more efficient and collaborate better.”
Purchasing Tickets
Prices vary between $10 and $20 for seats in the lower level of the Edith O’Donnell ATEC Building’s lecture hall. Tickets for balcony seats are $5.
Staff and faculty members can purchase up to four tickets for each lecture that will be discounted by $5. Emails were sent to staff and faculty with a discount code. The discount only applies to assigned seats in the $10 to $20 range.
If seats are still available, free standby tickets will be distributed to students with a valid Comet Card beginning one hour before the lecture. First come, first served. One ticket per student.
For more information and to purchase tickets, click here using a desktop or laptop computer.
Wallen said one of his priorities is building and strengthening partnerships with technology companies, such as Hewlett-Packard Co. and Intel, to stay ahead of the curve. In all the areas of technology architecture — including networking, storage and software engineering — he said his partners have assisted with moviemaking technology.
Wallen received the InfoWorld 2012 Technology Leadership Award, honoring senior executives who have demonstrated creative, effective leadership in inventing, managing or deploying technology within their organizations or in the information technology community.
“I received the award for a full body of work that led to a revolutionary new digital design and CG media platform we call Apollo. Apollo delivers a cloud-ready, enterprise-grade solution for the design and delivery of images, video and other forms of rich media,” Wallen said. “Apollo represents the next generation of media creation technology, deployed in and through the cloud enabling us to easily respond to scaling processor technology.
“In creating Apollo, my vision was to set a new course for innovation at the studio utilizing a novel approach — making our end users, namely our artists, intimately involved in the development process of software to enable creativity.”
Wallen will further detail his vision in his talk. Tickets are available now. For more information about Wallen or to view the full lineup of speakers for this year’s series, visit utdallas.edu/lectureseries.