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MillimeterMPEG-4 Expert Eric Petajan to Lead Face and Body Animation Authoring Tutorial at Workshop and Exhibition on MPEG-4
Jun 26, 2002 12:00 PM, Press Release
Eric Petajan, the leading authority on face and body animation for the MPEG-4 standard, will lead a tutorial on authoring animated characters with the latest MPEG-4 face and body animation tools at the 3rd Annual Workshop and Exhibition on MPEG-4, at the San Jose Fairmont Hotel, 170 South Market Street in San Jose, from 11:00 am – 12:30 pm on Thursday, June 27. The tutorial will demonstrate ways in which animated characters can be quickly and inexpensively produced for delivery over low-bit-rate Internet connections, including wireless. The session is open to the public and does not require previous animation experience.
Petajan will also appear on the WEMP-4 panel “Convergence After the Hype,” on Wednesday, June 26, from 4:00-6:00 pm, at the Fairmont Hotel, in which he will discuss the role that MPEG-4 plays in enabling true convergence of multimedia content.
Petajan, chief scientist and founder of face2face animation, is the premier developer of facial animation software and a growing producer of animated facial content, will also demonstrate new software MPEG-4 streaming of facial characters. Petajan has helped shape the MPEG-4 standard’s rules for facial animation as chairman of the MPEG-4 Face and Body Animation group.
Sponsored by the MPEG-4 Industry Forum, in cooperation with IEEE Circuits and Systems Society, the WEMP-4 event features expert tutorials on existing and upcoming MPEG-4 technologies, as well as exhibitions that showcase MPEG-4 products. For further information on the WEMP-4 event, visit the website at www.m4if.org/wemp2002
“MPEG-4 represents a tremendous breakthrough in the creation and delivery of face and body animation for all platforms – including film, television, the Web, and wireless – with new tools that enable the average graphical designer to ‘draw once, deliver anywhere,’” says Petajan. “This WEMP-4 tutorial will emphasize that there is a new generation of animators that will leverage MPEG-4 technologies for more creative, profitable production of animated content.”
Prior to forming face2face, Petajan was a Bell Labs researcher where he developed facial motion capture, HD video coding, and interactive graphics systems. Starting in 1989, Petajan was a leader in the development of digital HDTV technology standards, which led to the HDTV Grand Alliance, the foundation of today’s U.S. digital television standard. He received a PhD in electrical engineering in 1984 and an M.S. in Physics from the University of Illinois where he built the first automatic lip-reading system. Petajan is also associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology.
MPEG-4 is the interactive coding standard for all digital multimedia platforms. Developed by the Moving Picture Experts Group that designed MPEG-2 (the digital television standard), MPEG-1, and MPEG-3. Being object-based and extending beyond video and audio, MPEG-4 supports rich, interactive, standards-based multimedia from low bandwidths to transparent quality.
M4IF consists of more than 100 companies from diverse industries evenly distributed across North America, Europe, and Asia, addressing all MPEG-4 adoption issues that go beyond the charter of ISO/IEC MPEG. Activities of the forum include an interoperability program, certification, several working groups, access to ISO/MPEG committee members, and the 3rd annual Workshop and Exhibition on MPEG-4 from June 25-27 in San Jose, California. For more information, go to www.m4if.org
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