VFX Industry Technology Groups

ACM SIGGRAPH (commonly known as just SIGGRAPH) is an international community of researchers, artists, developers, filmmakers, scientists, and business professionals who share an interest in computer graphics and interactive techniques.

• (S)pecial (I)nterest (G)roup for (GRAPH)ics of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)
• 9 awards for various achievement in computer graphics research
• Hosts the annual SIGGRAPH North America and SIGGRAPH Asia conferences
• Chapters in many cities and student chapters at universities

• Visual Effects Society (VES) Technology Committee
• VFX Reference Platform
  • Google Group

The Visual Effects Society (VES) Technology Committee exists to research, encourage, present, and publish new methods, materials, processes and technologies that forward the arts, craft, and science of visual effects.

One of the (many) activities from the VES Technology committee is the VFX Reference Platform, a set of tool and library versions to be used as a common target platform for building software for the VFX industry. Its purpose is to minimise incompatibilities between different software packages, ease the support burden for Linux-based pipelines and encourage further adoption of Linux by software vendors.

• The Reference Platform is updated annually by a group of software vendors in collaboration with the Visual Effects Society Technology Committee.
• Published “Studio Platform Survey Report” in December 2021.
• Published “VFX Linux Distribution Recommendation Report” in August 2022.

• Projects
• Working Groups

The Academy Software Foundation (ASWF) is a group to increase the quality and quantity of open source contributions by developing a governance model, legal framework and community infrastructure that lowers the barrier to entry for developing and using open source software.

• Technically, the group is a directed fund of The Linux Foundation, with direct participation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
• Hosts “Open Source Days”, an event co-located with the annual SIGGRAPH North America conference, and “Open Source Forum”, an event timed to be with the VES Awards, held in Los Angeles.
• Published “Open Source in Entertainment” in March 2022.

• Science and Technology (SciTech) Council

Started in 2003, for members of the Academy only, the SciTech Council focuses on:

• Industry-wide projects and collaboration (the Technology and Research Initiatives Subcommittee)
• Technology History (Technology History Subcommittee)
• Public Programs and Education (Public Programs and Education Subcommittee)

(Note that this is different from the Academy Scientific and Technical Awards Committee, which awards the Technical Achievement Awards, the Scientific and Engineering Award, and Academy Award of Merit)

The Digital Production Symposium (DigiPro) is a conference that brings together the world’s premier creators of digital visual effects, animation, and interactive experiences. DigiPro grew out of a desire for more production-focused presentations from SIGGRAPH (which, by its nature, is more of a technical conference). It was started around 2012.

• The conference is always co-located with the annual SIGGRAPH conference in North America.

The Pipeline Conference (TPC) grew out of the extremely popular Pipeline Birds of a Feather (BoF) gathering at SIGGRAPH each year, which eventually required its own conference, started in 2020.

• The TPC took over the Pipeline Awards (which used to be held by Shotgun Software)
  • You can read my history of the Pipeline Awards
• The conference was co-located with the annual SIGGRAPH conference in North America.
  • The group is currently re-evaluating its future.
• The SIGGRAPH BoF still takes place and is still very popular.

StudioSysAdmins is a networking community dedicated to improving infrastructure, workflows, and support across the entertainment industry.

• Slack has more activity these days than the e-mail list or forums.

MovieLabs is a group to look at industry challenges, by helping architect next generation production technologies, streamline and automate distribution chains, deliver new experiences to consumers, and secure the creative assets that are the core capital of our industry.

Core project goals are to:

• Enable more efficient production workflows utilizing the latest technologies and modern software systems
• Improve backend infrastructure for distribution and production
• Enable new and better digital delivery for media content
• Improve media experiences for consumers

The Society of Motion Pictures and Television Engineers (SMPTE) is a global professional society of individuals and corporations collaborating for the advancement of all things technical in the motion picture, television and digital media industries, as well as an internationally recognized Standards organization, bringing order to the chaos of constantly evolving technologies with a high level of unbiased technical excellence.

The Trusted Partner Network (TPN) is a group that establishes a single benchmark of minimum security preparedness for all vendors and their teams, wherever they work, and whatever their specialty. Part of the Motion Picture Association (MPA).