Siggraph: Entis vindicated by graphics

In his keynote speech at this year's Siggraph event, Glenn Entis, vice president and chief visual and technical officer at EA, set out some of the key technical achievements that the games industry has made over its entertainment cousin, film.

The talk, entitled "Thrill Seeking in Interactive Real Time Graphics," compared the way that visuals are generated in the two industries, where some consoles run games at 60 frames per second, while film visuals run closer to a rate of three generated per hour.

He went on to talk about what he sees as the three key challenges for computer graphics moving forwards - characters, worlds and tools.

The first of these points revolved around the believability of characters, that it is not enough to simply add more polygons, and that "to connect with a character, audiences must believe what characters do, think and feel."

Entis further maintained that "Gamers demand natural forces at their control, and environments that respond," while the rise in popularity of social networking sites such as YouTube and Facebook demonstrate a "rebirth of creativity in the hands of many."

He later commented that he came in for some flak about his decision to work in the games industry over ten years ago, but that the way it has moved forward has vindicated his decision.

"Gaming has made the fastest improvements in graphics, but what is exciting is that we still have the furthest way to go. That's phenomenally exciting."

Siggraph is an annual conference specialising in computer graphics across the entertainment industries, and was this year held in San Diego.