Andrew Paul Witkin (July 22, 1952 – September 12, 2010) was an American
computer scientist
A computer scientist is a scientist who specializes in the academic study of computer science.
Computer scientists typically work on the theoretical side of computation. Although computer scientists can also focus their work and research on ...
who made major contributions in
computer vision
Computer vision tasks include methods for image sensor, acquiring, Image processing, processing, Image analysis, analyzing, and understanding digital images, and extraction of high-dimensional data from the real world in order to produce numerical ...
and
computer graphics
Computer graphics deals with generating images and art with the aid of computers. Computer graphics is a core technology in digital photography, film, video games, digital art, cell phone and computer displays, and many specialized applications. ...
.
Education
Witkin studied
psychology
Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...
at
Columbia College, Columbia University
Columbia College is the oldest undergraduate college of Columbia University, a private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhattan, it is the oldest instit ...
, for his bachelor's degree, and at
MIT
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of modern technology and sc ...
for his Ph.D supervised by
Whitman A. Richards.
[
]
Career
After MIT, Witkin worked briefly at SRI International
SRI International (SRI) is a nonprofit organization, nonprofit scientific research, scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California, United States. It was established in 1946 by trustees of Stanford Univer ...
on computer vision. He then moved to Schlumberger
Schlumberger (), doing business as SLB, is a global multinational oilfield services company. Founded in France in 1926, the company is now incorporated as Schlumberger NV in Willemstad, Curaçao, with principal executive offices in Houston ...
's Fairchild Laboratory for Artificial Intelligence Research, later Schlumberger Palo Alto Research, where he led research in computer vision and graphics; here he invented scale-space filtering, scale-space segmentation
Scale-space segmentation or multi-scale segmentation is a general framework for signal and image segmentation, based on the computation of image descriptors at multiple scales of smoothing.
One-dimensional hierarchical signal segmentation
Witk ...
and Active Contour Models and published several prize-winning papers.
From 1988 to 1998, he was a professor of computer science
Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...
, robotics
Robotics is the interdisciplinary study and practice of the design, construction, operation, and use of robots.
Within mechanical engineering, robotics is the design and construction of the physical structures of robots, while in computer s ...
, and art
Art is a diverse range of cultural activity centered around ''works'' utilizing creative or imaginative talents, which are expected to evoke a worthwhile experience, generally through an expression of emotional power, conceptual ideas, tec ...
at Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The institution was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools. In 1912, it became the Carnegie Institu ...
, after which he joined Pixar
Pixar (), doing business as Pixar Animation Studios, is an American animation studio based in Emeryville, California, known for its critically and commercially successful computer-animated feature films. Pixar is a subsidiary of Walt Disney ...
in Emeryville, California
Emeryville is a city located in northwest Alameda County, California, in the United States. It lies in a corridor between the cities of Berkeley, California, Berkeley and Oakland, California, Oakland, with a border on the shore of San Francisc ...
. At CMU and Pixar, with his colleagues he developed the methods and simulators used to model and render natural-looking cloth,computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for digitally generating Film, moving images. The more general term computer-generated imagery (CGI) encompasses both still images and moving images, while computer animation refers to moving images. Virtu ...
.
Awards and honors
The paper "Snakes: Active Contour Models"CiteSeer
CiteSeerX (formerly called CiteSeer) is a public search engine and digital library for scientific and academic papers, primarily in the fields of computer and information science.
CiteSeer's goal is to improve the dissemination and access of a ...
, this paper is the 11th most cited paper ever in computer science.[
]
The 1987 paper "Constraints on deformable models: Recovering 3D shape and nonrigid motion" was also a prize winner.[
He was a Founding Fellow of the ]Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence
The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) is an international Learned society, scientific society devoted to promote research in, and responsible use of, artificial intelligence. AAAI also aims to increase public under ...
. In 1992, Witkin and Kass were awarded the Prix Ars Electronica
The Prix Ars Electronica is one of the best known and longest running yearly prizes in the field of electronic and interactive art, computer animation, digital culture and music. It has been awarded since 1987 by Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria ...
computer graphics award for "Reaction–Diffusion Textures."
Witkin received the ACM SIGGRAPH
ACM SIGGRAPH is the international Association for Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques based in New York. It was founded in 1969 by Andy van Dam (its direct predecessor, ACM SICGRAPH was ...
Computer Graphics Achievement Award in 2001 "for his pioneering work in bringing a physics based approach to computer graphics."
As senior scientist at Pixar, Witkin received a technical Academy Award
The Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit in film. They are presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in the United States in recognition of excellence ...
in 2006 for "pioneering work in physically based computer-generated techniques used to simulate realistic cloth in motion pictures."[
]
Personal life
Andrew Witkin was the son of psychologist Herman Witkin and geneticist Evelyn M. Witkin. He was married to psychologist Sharon Witkin; they had two children.
Death
He died in a scuba diving accident off the coast of Monterey, California, on September 12, 2010. The 2011 film, ''Cars 2
''Cars 2'' is a 2011 American animated spy comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. It is the sequel to '' Cars'' (2006), the second film in the ''Cars'' franchise, and the 12th animated film from the studio ...
'' was dedicated in his memory along with Japeth Pieper in the credits.
References
Further reading
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External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Witkin, Andrew
1952 births
2010 deaths
American computer scientists
Accidental deaths in California
Columbia College (New York) alumni
Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni
20th-century American Jews
Carnegie Mellon University faculty
SRI International people
Academy Award for Technical Achievement winners
21st-century American Jews
Fellows of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence