by Let the technicians be rewarded.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences today revealed the 16 science and technology achievements that will be honored at its annual Scientific and Technical Awards ceremony next month. See the full list below.
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Achievements marked for scientific-technical awards do not need to have been developed and introduced during a specific period, but must demonstrate a proven track record of contributing significant value to the film-making process, according to AMPAS.
“Each year, a global group of professionals and technology experts sets out to examine the extraordinary tools and techniques used in the creation of movies,” said Barbara Ford Grant, chair of the Academy Scientific and Technical Awards Committee, which oversees the research. of background. the awards. “This year, we honor 16 technologies for their exceptional contributions to the way we create and enhance the cinematic experience, from the safe execution of special effects on set to new levels of image presentation fidelity and surround sound to open frames that They allow artists to share. your digital creations in different software and studios without problems. “These remarkable achievements in the arts and sciences of film have propelled our medium to unprecedented levels of greatness.”
The science and technology Oscar ceremony will take place on Friday, February 23 at the Academy of Motion Picture Museum in Los Angeles. Here’s the full list of the 2024 Academy Awards for Scientific and Technical Achievement, with descriptions via AMPAS:
Awards for technical achievements (academy certificates)
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To Bill Beck for his pioneering use of semiconductor lasers for theatrical laser projection systems. Bill Beck’s advocacy and education in the film industry while at Laser Light Engines contributed to the transition to laser projection in theatrical exhibition. To Gregory T. Niven for his pioneering work in the use of laser diodes for theatrical laser projection systems. At Novalux and Necsel, Gregory T. Niven demonstrated and refined specifications for laser light sources for theatrical exhibition, leading the industry’s transition to laser cinema projection technology. To Yoshitaka Nakatsu, Yoji Nagao, Tsuyoshi Hirao, Tomonori Morizumi and Kazuma Kozuru for their development of laser diodes for theatrical laser projection systems. Yoshitaka Nakatsu, Yoji Nagao, Tsuyoshi Hirao, Tomonori Morizumi, and Kazuma Kozuru collaborated closely with film professionals and manufacturers while at Nichia Corporation’s Laser Diode Division, leading to the development and industry-wide adoption of blue laser modules. and greens that produce matching wavelengths and power levels. the specific needs of the film market.
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To Arnold Peterson and Elia P. Popov for their continued design and engineering, and to John Frazier for the initial concept of the Blind Driver Roof Pod. The roof module improves the safety, speed and range of stunt driving, expanding options for camera placement while acquiring images of the talented car in the vehicle, leading to rapid industry-wide adoption.
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To Jon G. Belyeu for the design and engineering of the Movie Works cable cutting devices. The unique and rugged design of this set of pyrotechnic cable cutters has made them the preferred method for the safe, accurate and reliable release of suspension cables for over three decades in film production.
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To James Eggleton and Delwyn Holroyd for the design, implementation and integration of the High Density Encoding (HDE) lossless compression algorithm within the Codex recording toolset. The HDE codec allows productions to leverage familiar and proven Camera Raw workflows more efficiently by reducing the storage and bandwidth required for the larger amounts of data from high-shot cameras.
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To Jeff Lait, Dan Bailey, and Nick Avramoussis for the continued evolution and expansion of the OpenVDB feature set. Major engineering developments contributed by the OpenVDB open source community have led to its continued success as an enabling platform for representing and manipulating volumetric data from natural phenomena. These additions have helped solidify OpenVDB as an industry standard that drives continued innovation in visual effects.
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To Oliver Castle and Marcus Schoo for the design and engineering of Atlas, and to Keith Lackey for the prototyping and initial development of Atlas. Atlas’ scene description and evaluation framework enables the integration of multiple digital content creation tools into a cohesive production process. Its plug-in architecture and efficient evaluation engine provide consistent rendering from virtual production to lighting.
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To Lucas Miller, Christopher Jon Horvath, Steve LaVietes and Joe Ardent for the creation of the Alembic Caching and Interchange system. Alembic’s algorithms for storing and retrieving stored and time-sampled data enable highly efficient caching throughout the digital production process and scene sharing between facilities. As an open source exchange library, Alembic has seen widespread adoption by major software vendors and production studios.
Scientific and Engineering Awards (Academy Plaques)
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To Charles Q. Robinson, Nicolas Tsingos, Christophe Chabanne, Mark Vinton and the Cinema Audio Group team of software, hardware and implementation engineers at Dolby Laboratories for the creation of the Dolby Atmos Cinema Sound System. Dolby Atmos has become an industry standard for creating object-based cinematic audio content and presents a premium immersive audio experience for theatrical audiences.
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To Steve Read and Barry Silverstein for their contributions to the design and development of the IMAX Prismless laser projector. Using a novel optical mirror system, the IMAX Prismless Laser Projector removes prisms from the laser light path to create the high brightness and contrast needed for IMAX theatrical presentation.
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To Peter Janssens, Goran Stojmenovik and Wouter D’Oosterlinck for the design and development of the Barco RGB laser projector. The novel modular design of Barco’s RGB laser projector with an internally integrated laser light source produces uniform, flicker-free image fields with improved contrast and brightness, enabling a widely adopted upgrade path from xenon to laser presentation without the need to modify the screen or projection booth. Layout of existing theaters.
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To Michael Perkins, Gerwin Damberg, Trevor Davies and Martin J. Richards for the design and development of the Christie E3LH Dolby Vision cinema projection system, implemented in collaboration between the Dolby Cinema and Christie Digital engineering teams. The Christie E3LH Dolby Vision cinema projection system uses a novel dual modulation technique that employs cascaded DLP chips along with an enhanced laser optical path, enabling high dynamic range theatrical presentation.
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To Ken Museth, Peter Cucka and Mihai Aldén for the creation of OpenVDB and its continued impact within the film industry. For over a decade, OpenVDB’s core voxel data structures, programming interface, file format, and rich data manipulation tools remain the standard for efficiently representing complex volumetric effects such as water, fire and smoke.
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To Jaden Oh for the concept and development of the Marvelous Designer clothing creation system. Marvelous Designer introduced a pattern-based approach to digital costume construction, unifying design and visualization and providing a virtual analogy to physical tailoring. Under the direction of Jaden Oh, CLO Virtual Fashion’s team of engineers, UX designers, and 3D designers have helped elevate the quality of look and movement in digital costume creations.
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To F. Sebastian Grassia, Alex Mohr, Sunya Boonyatera, Brett Levin, and Jeremy Cowles for the design and engineering of Pixar’s Universal Scene Description. USD is the first open source scene description framework capable of accommodating the entire scope of production workflow across a variety of studio pipelines. Its robust engineering and mature design are exemplified by its versatile layering system and high-performance crate file format. The wide adoption of USD has made it a de facto 3D scene sharing format, enabling alignment and collaboration across the film industry. collection, the Academy preserves our cinematic history and presents honest and powerful programs about the past, present and future of cinema. In all initiatives, the Academy connects global audiences – its members, the film industry and film fans – through their shared passion for making and watching films.
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