CS200 Interview: Professor Pat Hanrahan
For my
interview, I interviewed Prof. Pat Hanrahan, who?s well known in the
department for his work in graphics and the graphics lab. He
teaches classes like CS248 and some 448 seminars. His current
research interests range from optimizing rendering techniques to
interactive workspaces (with Prof. Winograd).
Background
Interestingly
enough, Prof. Hanrahan?s undergraduate and graduate education were in the
fields of Nuclear Engineering and Biophysics, rather than computer
science or graphics. He attributes his ability to enter the
graphics field partly to the immaturity of the field at the time.
He began to be interested in graphics while working with modeling the
neural system of a particular species of worm. From there he worked
at NYIT for a summer working on modeling and graphics. From there
he taught computer science at Princeton for 5 years before coming to
Stanford. Somewhere in between this time span, he also worked at
Pixar for 3 years, working on finding new technologies for rendering and
graphics.
Graphics Major
From
an academic perspective, Prof. Hanrahan recommends a great deal of
classes outside the standard CSx48 track. Two classes of note are
highly recommended. First, it helps greatly to have extensive
education in mathematics on the level of Analysis and Complex
Analysis. While Linear Algebra is the basis for a lot of graphics,
other areas of math are used extensively in upper level tasks.
Second, Prof. Hanrahan really stresses the need to take classes on art
and art history. A lot of people enter the industry with knowledge
of the tools and algorithms for creating complex objects, but without the
creative aspect art provides, they essentially only have half of the
skills needed for a majority of the graphics related jobs in
industry.
Graphics Industry
It is
tricky breaking into the graphics industry. Unlike some other
computer science related fields, there is no natural course progression
that one can take in college that will prepare them for industry.
Much of what employers look for involve work done outside the
classroom. There are two good ways to help break into
industry. First, it helps to work through a masters degree, which
will involve you in writing a dissertation or directed research. In
either case, you are doing work on the breaking edge of technology.
Second, you can work as part of a team in a project. Maybe create a
short animated feature, or something that industries like Pixar would
like to see. Once you?re in the field, there are two major classes
of graphics people. One is tools, where you work on improving the
technology and updating the tools and interface used to render. The
second is the renderer himself, who uses his creative and artistic
talents to create breathtaking works of art. There are a number of
subdivisions as well. For example, in the renderer class, this is
subdivided into technical director and animator, etc. In general,
entering the industry is something that requires a lot more independent
initiative than some other fields.