Patrick M. Hanrahan (born 1954) is an American

computer graphics Computer graphics deals with generating images with the aid of computers. Today, computer graphics is a core technology in digital photography, film, video games, cell phone and computer displays, and many specialized applications. A great de ...

researcher, the

Canon Canon or Canons may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Canon (fiction), the conceptual material accepted as official in a fictional universe by its fan base * Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture ** Western ca ...

USA Professor of

Computer Science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to practical disciplines (includi ...

and Electrical Engineering in the Computer Graphics Laboratory at Stanford University. His research focuses on

rendering algorithm Rendering or image synthesis is the process of generating a photorealistic or non-photorealistic image from a 2D or 3D model by means of a computer program. The resulting image is referred to as the render. Multiple models can be defined ...

graphics processing unit A graphics processing unit (GPU) is a specialized electronic circuit designed to manipulate and alter memory to accelerate the creation of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display device. GPUs are used in embedded systems, m ...

s, as well as

scientific illustration An illustration is a decoration, interpretation or visual explanation of a text, concept or process, designed for integration in print and digital published media, such as posters, flyers, magazines, books, teaching materials, animations, vi ...

and

visualization Visualization or visualisation may refer to: * Visualization (graphics), the physical or imagining creation of images, diagrams, or animations to communicate a message * Data visualization, the graphic representation of data * Information visuali ...

. He has received numerous awards, including the 2019

Turing Award The ACM A. M. Turing Award is an annual prize given by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) for contributions of lasting and major technical importance to computer science. It is generally recognized as the highest distinction in comput ...

Education and academic work

Hanrahan grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin. He attended the

University of Wisconsin–Madison A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...

and graduated with a B.S. in nuclear engineering in 1977, continued his education there, and as a graduate student taught a new computer science course in graphics in 1981. One of his first students was an art graduate student,

Donna Cox Donna J. Cox is an American artist and scientist, Michael Aiken Endowed Chair; Professor of Art + Design; Director, Advanced Visualization Lab at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC); Director, Visualization and Experimental Tech ...

, now known for her art and

scientific visualization Scientific visualization ( also spelled scientific visualisation) is an interdisciplinary branch of science concerned with the visualization of scientific phenomena. Michael Friendly (2008)"Milestones in the history of thematic cartography, s ...

s. In the 1980s he went to work at the New York Institute of Technology Computer Graphics Laboratory and at

Digital Equipment Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC ), using the trademark Digital, was a major American company in the computer industry from the 1960s to the 1990s. The company was co-founded by Ken Olsen and Harlan Anderson in 1957. Olsen was president un ...

under

Edwin Catmull Edwin Earl "Ed" Catmull (born March 31, 1945) is an American computer scientist who is the co-founder of Pixar and was the President of Walt Disney Animation Studios. He has been honored for his contributions to 3D computer graphics, including th ...

. He returned to U.W. Madison and completed his Ph.D. in

biophysics Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from molecular to organismic and populations. ...

in 1985.

Career

As a founding employee at

Pixar Pixar Animation Studios (commonly known as Pixar () and stylized as P I X A R) is an American computer animation studio known for its critically and commercially successful computer animated feature films. It is based in Emeryville, Californ ...

Animation Studios, from 1986 to 1989 Hanrahan was part of the design of the

RenderMan Interface Specification The RenderMan Interface Specification, or RISpec in short, is an open API developed by Pixar Animation Studios to describe three-dimensional scenes and turn them into digital photorealistic images. It includes the RenderMan Shading Language. As ...

and the

RenderMan Shading Language Renderman Shading Language (abbreviated RSL) is a component of the RenderMan Interface Specification, and is used to define shaders. The language syntax is C-like. A shader written in RSL can be used without changes on any RenderMan-compliant ren ...

. He was credited in Pixar productions including The Magic Egg (1984),

Tin Toy ''Tin Toy'' is a 1988 American computer-animated short film produced by Pixar and directed by John Lasseter. The short film, which runs five minutes, stars Tinny, a tin one-man band toy, attempting to escape from Billy, an infant. The third ...

(1988) and

Toy Story ''Toy Story'' is a 1995 American computer-animated comedy film directed by John Lasseter (in his feature directorial debut), produced by Pixar Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The first installment in the '' Toy Story ...

(1995). In 1989 Hanrahan joined the faculty of

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

. In 1995 he moved to Stanford University. In 2003 Hanrahan co-founded

Tableau Software Tableau Software ( ) is an American interactive data visualization software company focused on business intelligence. It was founded in 2003 in Mountain View, California, and is currently headquartered in Seattle, Washington. In 2019 the comp ...

and remains its chief scientist. In February 2005 Stanford University was named the first regional visualization and analytics center for the

United States Department of Homeland Security The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. Its stated missions involve anti-terr ...

, focused on problems in information visualization and visual analytics. In 2011

Intel Research The Intel Research Labs were a research division of Intel. The organization was known for most of its life as Intel Research, but towards the end of its life the name Intel Research was re-defined to refer to all research performed in Intel, includ ...

announced funding for a center for visual computing, co-led by Hanrahan and Jim Hurley of Intel. He was the doctoral advisor of Peter Schröder and Tamara Munzner.

Awards

Hanrahan received three

Academy Awards The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

for his work in rendering and computer graphics research. In 1993 Hanrahan and other Pixar founding employees were awarded a scientific and engineering award for RenderMan. In 2004 he shared a technical achievement award with Stephen R. Marschner and

Henrik Wann Jensen Henrik Wann Jensen (born 1969 in Harlev, Jutland, Denmark) is a Denmark, Danish computer graphics researcher. He is best known for developing the photon mapping technique as the subject of his PhD thesis, but has also done important research in sim ...

, for research in simulating

subsurface scattering Subsurface scattering (SSS), also known as subsurface light transport (SSLT), is a mechanism of light transport in which light that penetrates the surface of a translucent object is scattered by interacting with the material and exits the surfa ...

of light in translucent materials. In 2014 he shared a technical achievement award with

Matt Pharr Matt Pharr is a computer graphics researcher and author, and one of the primary originators of the physically based rendering process. His research focuses on Rendering (computer graphics), rendering algorithms, graphics processing units, as well as ...

and Greg Humphreys, for their formalization and reference implementation of the concepts behind

physically based rendering Physically based rendering (PBR) is a computer graphics approach that seeks to render images in a way that models the flow of light in the real world. Many PBR pipelines aim to achieve photorealism. Feasible and quick approximations of the b ...

, as shared in their book ''Physically Based Rendering''. Hanrahan received the 2003 SIGGRAPH Steven A. Coons Award for Outstanding Creative Contributions to Computer Graphics, for "leadership in rendering algorithms, graphics architectures and systems, and new visualization methods for computer graphics", and the 1993 SIGGRAPH Computer Graphics Achievement Award. He was inducted into the 2018 ACM SIGGRAPH Academy Inaugural Class. He received the 2006 Career Award for Visualization Research from the

IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operat ...

Technical Committee on Visualization and Graphics (VGTC) at the IEEE Visualization Conference, He became a member of the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of ...

in 1999, a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

in 2007 and of the Association for Computing Machinery in 2008, and received three university teaching awards at Stanford. Hanrahan shared the 2019 ACM A.M. Turing Award with Catmull for their pioneering efforts on computer-generated imagery.

Quotes

* ''Curiosity and passion determine success''

References

External links

Pat Hanrahan's academic home page
* * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hanrahan, Pat Living people Computer graphics professionals Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery Stanford University School of Engineering faculty Stanford University Department of Electrical Engineering faculty University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty University of Wisconsin–Madison College of Engineering alumni 1954 births New York Institute of Technology faculty Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Academy Award for Technical Achievement winners Turing Award laureates