March 3: Wim Sweldens
"The Mathematics of Movie Making"
Abstract
Most of us do not have mathematics on our minds when we sit back and
relax in a movie theater. Yet you would be surprised to learn just how
much geometry, analysis, and numerical computation is behind the screen,
especially for the new 3D animated movies such as Toy Story. In this
talk we present some of the basic algorithms needed in creating
realistic 3D geometry. In particular we will discuss subdivision, a
simple iterative procedure for creating smooth curves and surfaces.
