Call

2022 Elections: Call for Nominees for the Board of Directors

NYC ACM SIGGRAPH is run by volunteers. The NYC ACM SIGGRAPH Board of Directors provides direction and oversight for the organization.

It is time for Elections for 2022 – 2024. We are seeking nominees for President, Treasurer, and five At Large Board of Director positions. All nominees must be current members of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH who have been a member for at least one year; members with less than one year membership who have been a primary organizer on an event or presented at an event are eligible to run for the Board. (Nominees for Officer positions must be current members of the Board of Directors.) Experience with the organization as a volunteer is also strongly encouraged, but not required.

If you are interested in running for the Board or would like to nominate someone, let us know. You can nominate yourself using this Google form [link].

If you wish to nominate somebody else, contact the Elections Chair

For the upcoming elections, nominations must be made no later than 11:59PM EDT on Friday, June 15, 2022.

Nominations must be accompanied by the nominee’s name, address, telephone number, and email address. It should also include a brief bio (maximum of 100 words) and a statement explaining why the nominee would like to run for the Board. This statement should be no more than 250 words and address the following items:

  • Why do you want to be a member of the NYC ACM SIGGRAPH Board of Directors?
  • What activities would you like to see NYC ACM SIGGRAPH develop?
  • In what areas would you like to participate on committees?
  • How will current interests of yours contribute to the board and the NYC ACM SIGGRAPH community?

Board Membership can be truly rewarding

  • Board members (Directors) help to direct the vision and mission of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH.
  • Board members propose, plan, coordinate, and manage NYC ACM SIGGRAPH events.
  • Board members interact with the NYC metro area CG and digital arts community.
  • Board members work with industry and academic leaders in this community.
  • Board members often serve as mentors for NYC ACM SIGGRAPH volunteers.

Of course, being a BOD member also carries certain responsibilities

The Votes are Tallied

Please join me in congratulation with their unanimous re-election: Scott Lang (vice-president), Mark Reynolds (Secretary) and Danesh Taraporevala (Director at Large)

Three people were written in for a Director at Large position, we will contact them to see whether they are willing and able to serve.

Summer Break

Zoom fatigue has set it, and we all need to get out more. The chapter will be taking the summer off. We will be back in Fall, with our September BYOA and MetroCAF 2021. If you are a student: there is still time to submit to our festival! All current members can expect a ballot for this year’s board election in the mail shortly

Image by Phil Roeder (Flickr)

2021-2023 BOD Candidates

If you are a member of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH you can expect a ballot for this years elections in your mailbox shortly. Here are the candidates you will find on the ballot:

Scott Lang

Candidate for Vice President

Statement

I have been involved with NYC ACM SIGGRAPH since I first volunteered over thirty years and I continue to volunteer because I appreciate the opportunity to give back to a community that means a great deal to me. During my time as Vice-Chair I have been able to meet and work with a wide variety of people from all areas of the computer graphics and interactive techniques fields. Providing others with a platform to share and discuss their views, ideas, successes and failures is essential to the mission of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH. Allowing our members the chance to interact with those they might not otherwise come in contact helps lead to greater connections, larger networks, and more exchanges within the NYC-area digital media community.

We have had great success with a number of our existing events – BYOA, Industry Spotlight, MetroCAF – so those are terrific vehicles for us to build upon. I’d also like to see us expand the scope of our events to include more specialized areas such as visualization and virtual reality. Our partnerships with other groups have been very positive so we’ll continue to grow those. The pandemic has also shown us that remote events are viable activities that may allow us to feature speakers (and attract attendees) from all around the world so scheduling remote events in the future may be an option. Another possibility is a regularly scheduled panel held each month, featuring 3 – 4 speakers from different focus areas, which would allow for greater discussion amongst the panelists and our members. We are also working to bring back our very popular Member-Only Site Visits.

With your support, I look forward to serving as Vice-Chair for another two years. Thank you.

Bio

I have served as NYC ACM SIGGRAPH Vice-Chair for the last ten years. My main responsibility in this role is to organize the chapter’s events calendar. I also co-chaired MetroCAF twice during this time. I have also been Executive Producer for the ACM SIGGRAPH SCOOP Team and for the ACM SIGGRAPH YouTube channel. When not volunteering for ACM SIGGRAPH, I work as the Video Production / Interactive Design Instructor at the Bergen County Academies, a magnet high school in northern New Jersey.

Mark Reynolds

Candidate for Secretary

Statement

The first NYC ACM SIGGRAPH event I attended was 2014’s Industry Spotlight, and I knew immediately I wanted to be involved with this organization that brought together area practitioners of the mystical arts of computer graphics. Through the chapter’s events over the years I have been able to meet and talk shop many industry professionals and animation hobbyists, not to mention get a good look at the cutting edge of CG thanks to our many panels and presentations featuring local industry luminaries. By continuing to serve NYC ACM SIGGRAPH as Secretary I would be able to help realize more local events covering a wide range of interests while continuing to develop our chapter’s mainstay events, such as Industry Spotlight and Bring Your Own Animation, and hopefully introducing them to wider audiences, growing our community.

Bio

Mark Reynolds is a New York City-based animator and visual effects artist who has created work for screens large, small, virtual, and live-projected. In addition to his freelance work, he teaches Maya and After Effects at the New York Film Academy. He has served as a member of the NYC ACM SIGGRAPH Board of Directors since 2014, and as Secretary since 2016. During his tenure with the chapter he has co-chaired two editions of MetroCAF and continues to assist with the organization and realization of various panels and events, including the monthly Bring Your Own Animation.

Danesh Taraporevala

Candidate for Director at Large

Statement

I have been an active member of SIGGRAPH for the past 8 years and have always volunteered my time for SIGGRAPH events. I do this purely out of love for the VFX and animation community of New York. I co chaired the MetroCAF 2020 event and we figured out how to get students work across during the pandemic in our virtual event. If elected I would do the same and put in more energy into our events and activities as we steer clear of the shutdown and begin opening up.

Bio

My Name is Danesh Taraporevala and I have been working as a 3D artist for the past 10 years in New York City. I have had the pleasure of working with some of the top studios in the city like Afterparty VFX, Hornet, Alkemy-X, Los York, Brand New School, Vayner Media, Transistor Studios, Method, Artjail, Ntropic, The Molecule, R/GA, Sid Lee, Psyop, Charlex, Gravity (Formerly Rhino FX), The Napoleon Group, Tag Creative, Fake Love, Framestore, Suspect, TBWA to name a few.

I have been serving as a board member since the past 4 years and had the pleasure of co chairing MetroCAF 2020.

Call

2021 Elections : Call for Nominees for the Board of Directors

NYC ACM SIGGRAPH is run by volunteers. The NYC ACM SIGGRAPH Board of Directors provides direction and oversight for the organization.

It is time for Elections for 2021 – 2023. We are seeking nominees for Vice -President, Secretary, and five At Large Board of Director positions. All nominees must be current members of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH who have been a member for at least one year; members with less than one year membership who have been a primary organizer on an event or presented at an event are eligible to run for the Board. (Nominees for Officer positions must be current members of the Board of Directors.) Experience with the organization as a volunteer is also strongly encouraged, but not required.

If you are interested in running for the Board or would like to nominate someone, let us know. You can nominate yourself using this Google form [link].

If you wish to nominate somebody else, contact the Elections Chair

For the upcoming elections, nominations must be made no later than 11:59PM EDT on Saturday, May 15, 2021.

Nominations must be accompanied by the nominee’s name, address, telephone number, and email address. It should also include a brief bio (maximum of 100 words) and a statement explaining why the nominee would like to run for the Board. This statement should be no more than 250 words and address the following items:

  • Why do you want to be a member of the NYC ACM SIGGRAPH Board of Directors?
  • What activities would you like to see NYC ACM SIGGRAPH develop?
  • In what areas would you like to participate on committees?
  • How will current interests of yours contribute to the board and the NYC ACM SIGGRAPH community?

Board Membership can be truly rewarding

  • Board members (Directors) help to direct the vision and mission of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH.
  • Board members propose, plan, coordinate, and manage NYC ACM SIGGRAPH events.
  • Board members interact with the NYC metro area CG and digital arts community.
  • Board members work with industry and academic leaders in this community.
  • Board members often serve as mentors for NYC ACM SIGGRAPH volunteers.

Of course, being a BOD member also carries certain responsibilities

Elections

The votes are in and three board members have been re-elected: Michael Hosenfeld as President, Wobbe F. Koning as Treasurer, and Patty K. Wongpakdee as Director as Large. You can find out more about them here: Meet the Candidates

There was one write in candidate, we are checking whether this person is willing and able to serve.

We are still a few board members short. New election are coming up shortly, for the 2021-2023 terms. Both our Vice-President and Secretary will be up for re-election. In addition we will be looking to fill four or five Director at Large positions (depending on whether the write-in candidate from the past election will join the board)

If you are thinking about joining us, don’t hesitate to contact us! You have to be a current chapter member, having volunteered at and attended our events is of course a plus.

Meet the Candidates

If you are a member of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH you can expect a ballot for this years elections in your mailbox shortly. Here are the candidates you will find on the ballot

Michael Hosenfeld

Candidate for President

Bio

Michael Hosenfeld is a Visual Effects Supervisor for film and TV, as well as an Associate Professor of Digital Arts & Design at New York Institute of Technology. Based on his education in Industrial Design, he joined the VFX industry in the mid 90s, worked on feature films in the German branch of Toronto-based c.o.r.e. Digital pictures, and eventually moved to NYC to teach at New York University, the Center for Advanced Digital Applications and later at New York Institute of Technology. He joined the Board of Directors of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH in 2003, and also served as its President from 2007-2010 and 2018-2020.

Statement

Serving on the board of directors since 2003, and presently its President for a second term, I understand my role as a facilitators for our board and our members to develop new ideas for events that reflect the ever changing variety of computer graphics applications in our community. To support our board in its efforts to create new and exciting events, but also to increase the involvement of our community it is crucial to further develop our outreach and the communication with our members, and the entire community, especially in these difficult times during COVID when we can’t gather in groups. But moving events online also opens new opportunity to reach audiences that would not be able to commute to an actual venue, and to offer small and specialized presentations hard to accommodate in a costly venue. And so I hope to hear from our membership. Get involved.

Wobbe F. Koning

Candidate for Treasurer

Bio

As associate professor I head the animation program at Monmouth University in New Jersey. I received a BFA from the Netherlands Film and Television Academy in Amsterdam and a MFA in Art and Technology from the Ohio State University. I have been an active member of ACM SIGGRAPH ever since I was a student volunteer back in 1998 and am currently the Education Committee resources sub-committee chair. As an independent digital artist I created many animations that have been shown at numerous festivals. My latest work is (3D printed) stop motion animation.

Statement

I joined NYC ACM SIGGRAPH when I moved to the NYC area in 2005 and became a member of the board shortly thereafter. ACM SIGGRAPH has played an important role in shaping my career as a digital artist. Giving others the opportunity I had to benefit from the organization is an important motivation behind my involvement both in the chapter and at the national level.
I have been serving as treasurer for a while now. The chapter is in currently good shape financially and I intend to keep it that way. I am precise, conscientious and willing to continue to manage the chapter’s finances.
I have been acting as web-master for as long as I’ve been with the chapter, and recently launched a new incarnation of it. Our MetroCAF festival is one of the events I am involved in and whenever I can I like to show new work at BYOA.

Patty K. Wongpakdee

Candidate for Director At Large

Bio

I am a New York City based graphic artist and a tenured associate professor of graphic design at New York Institute of Technology, New York. For over 15 years, I have been committed to providing students with a strong fundamental knowledge of industry standards while encouraging creative thinking and problem solving skills.

I am passionate about the up-cycling objective. Art Without Waste: 500 Upcycle & Earth-Friendly Designs, is a book (Rockport Publisher) where I curated and showcased cutting-edge designers, illustrators and artists from around the world, whose work often incorporates eco-friendly principles such as up-cycling, with sustainability as a central goal of their work.

I’m also a recipient of the In-house Design Award from Graphic Design USA. The award recognizes her pro-bono graphic design work for the American Cancer Society, New York City. Her art and design work has been shown in several juried exhibitions in traditional and online galleries, various print and digital publications.

Statement

As a professor, I have encouraged creative thinking and problem-solving skills to my students while providing a fundamental knowledge of industry standards and expectations. The events produced by NYC ACM SIGGRAPH has permitted students a unique glimpse into various creative careers; allowing the attendees to learn from industry leaders and understand how they can participate in the ever-changing landscape of digital art and design. Human interaction with digital art and design has become more intertwined through unique ways of mixing different types of media. The combination of art and technology with the inclusion of science and engineering has reshaped the visual communication experience by engaging the viewer in a multi-dimensional manner that is unique to each observer/user. My interest lies within multi-disciplinary collaboration that motivates the re-imagination of digital art and design projects with emphasis on eco-friendly designs that limits environmental impact. As an educator and visual communicator, I also believe in the organization’s mission to “foster the synthesis of art and technology while promoting and educating …innovative ideas.” As a board member, I would assist NYC ACM SIGGRAPH with their continued efforts to provide noteworthy events to an interested community. I would like to help plan, coordinate and work with various designers, artists, scientists and technology experts to help produce events that are leading edge with stimulating discussions within the digital arts and design industry. Thank you and I hope to be considered for a position as a board member of NYC ACM SIGGRAPH.