2001 ILDA Awards
Presented in November 2001 at an online webcast (no Conference due to 9/11 attack). Webcast hosted and produced by Lighting Systems Design Inc. in Orlando, Florida.
The International Laser Display Association's (ILDA) annual awards for artistic and technical excellence--the laser display industry's equivalent of Hollywood's Oscars--this year honored more than a dozen companies from around the world. The eleven artistic award categories covered virtually all aspects of modern laser displays, from the production of huge outdoor shows to the creation of individual graphic frames.
ILDA's Fenning Awards for technical achievement recognized two major breakthroughs with a First-place tie. Pangolin Laser Systems of Orlando received First Place for a new software "plug-in" that allows artists to create laser shows directly from the popular 3D Studio Max program, a high-end software package widely used by computer graphics artists. When it comes to projecting those images, laser artists can take advantage of the Schneider Showlaser, the first high-powered white-light laser that is completely solid-state. Audio-Visual Imagineering (AVI) of Orlando and Schneider Laser Technologies of Turkheim, Germany, jointly received a First Place award for the Showlaser, which produces 10-watts of color-balanced white-light yet runs off a standard 220-volt outlet.
ILDA's winning artistic entries covered a broad spectrum of display applications that pushed technological and creative limits. Lightspeed Design Group of Bellevue, Wash., stretched the limits of display technology for its Sea World animation with 80K scanning at 30 frames per second. Laser Force, Inc., of Milwaukee, Wisc., took honors for a hand-drawn 430-frame animation sequence depicting a traditional Native American dance. LaserAnimation Sollinger of Berlin strived to visually convey an operatic aria with soft and subtle laser graphics. The wild, irregular sounds of a percussive bongo performance were brought to light with kinetic beams by LOBO electronic of Aalen, Germany.
The highest number of awards received by any single company was six, an honor shared by Audio Visual Imagineering, Laser Force, Inc., LaserAnimation Sollinger, and LOBO electronic. The highest number of First Place awards went to LOBO electronic, which took top honors in the ISP (ILDA Standard Projector) Beam Module, Beams/Atmospherics, Graphic Module and Indoor Show categories. LOBO was followed by Chicago's Strictly FX, which took first place in the ISP Computer Animation, ISP Graphic Module, and the ISP Graphic and Beam Module categories.
Due to the cancellation of this year's ILDA conference (originally scheduled Nov. 11-14 in Orlando), the results of the awards competition were presented in the November issue of The Laserist, ILDA's quarterly print publication and at ILDA's Web site.
A gallery of selected award-winning entries is here.
The 2001 Awards Program, listing the judges and all the winners, is available to download here.
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2001 Artistic Awards
Judges
Brian Matthews is a native Floridian and a graduate of the Ringling School of Art and Design in Sarasota, Florida. He served as Art Director for the South Florida Museum and Bishop Planetarium, helping to produce laser lightshows and educational planetarium shows. He was been involved with production of CD-ROM games for children, and creation of graphic content and animation for the Internet. Brian currently freelances in the traditional and digital art field and produces his own online animated cartoon series called Stonetrek. He is also a musician and an avid amateur astronomer.
Carol Seidel has been in the Laser field for 30 years. She began studying lasers on an NSF High School Science Summer Fellowship. Carol studied laser and optics at Caltech under Dr. William Bridges, inventor of the ion laser, and received her B.S . in Applied Physics from Caltech. She also did graduate management studies at Boston University European Campus. Carol has designed laser optical components and developed systems including: many application specific ion laser systems; the first commercial frequency doubled ring dye laser; the first photopically balanced RGB laser for the display industry; and, the Omniscan 2020 laser planetarium projector. Ms Seidel is currently working in engineering on many projects in remote sensing, defense, telecommunications and laser display.
Barton Wells has been a member of the entertainment industry for the past 18 years. His focus for most of that time has been in lighting for live theater and nightclubs. He was first introduced to the laser industry seven years ago when he started working at Epcot with the IllumiNations crew. His education was supplemented by having the opportunity to work with Lighting Systems Design Inc., learning both set-up and programming of laser shows over the past six years. He is honored to be a part of ILDA as an Artistic Awards judge, and assisting in production at previous ILDA conferences. Bart would like to give many thanks to Melissa Chisholm, Greg Makhov and numerous others who have helped him develop his knowledge and growth in the industry. “Peace to us all, united we will overcome.”ILDA Standard Projector (ISP) categories
2001 ISP Beam Module
1st: "Movement", LOBO electronic
2nd: "The Bongo Show", LaserAnimation Sollinger
3rd: "Operation Blade", LaserAnimation Sollinger2001 ISP Cel Animation
1st: "Franky's Night Out", Audio Visual Imagineering
2nd: "Indian Dance", Laser Force
3rd: "Dolphin", LOBO electronic
Honorable Mention: "Pegasus Morphs Into a Jet", Laser Force2001 ISP Computer Animation
1st: "Wolf Head", Strictly FX
2nd: "Homero", Lightspeed Design Group
3rd: "Pangolin ID", Pangolin Laser Systems
Honorable Mention: "Metamorphosis", LaserAnimation Sollinger
Honorable Mention: "Sea World", Lightspeed Design Group2001 ISP Graphic Module
1st: "LaVida Loca", Strictly FX
2nd: "Belle Nuit", LaserAnimation Sollinger
3rd (tie): "Dead Man's Party", Audio Visual Imagineering
3rd (tie): "One More Time", Strictly FX
Honorable Mention: "Rhapsody in Balloon", Laser Force2001 ISP Graphic and Beam Module
1st: "Carol of the Bells", Strictly FX
2nd: "Digital Get Down", Audio Visual Imagineering
3rd: "Music", Audio Visual Imagineering
Honorable Mention: "MicroManiac", Laser SpectaclesNon-ISP categories
2001 Beams/Atmospherics
1st: "Living Drums", LOBO electronic
2nd (tie): "Classglass", LDS Light Design
2nd (tie): "Aurora", LOBO electronic2001 Abstract
1st: "Fight Song, Laser Fantasy International
2nd: "New Year's Day", Audio Visual Imagineering2001 Graphic Module
1st: "LOBO 2001", LOBO electronic
2nd: "The Sunshine Show", LaserAnimation Sollinger
3rd: "Love at First Kiss", Audio Visual Imagineering
Honorable Mention: "Spain: Rockin' Gypsies", Laser Fantasy International
Honorable Mention: "Help", Laser Force
Honorable Mention: "Fatal Destiny", Laser Force2001 Indoor Show
1st: "Ostwurttemberg-Show", LOBO electronic
2nd: "Proxi", HB Laserkomponenten
3rd: "Citroen C5 Presentation", Laser Entertainment2001 Outdoor Show
1st: "Nam June Paik's Laser Art at Seoul Olympic Park", Sam Laser Display
2nd: "Mattel Pre-Toy Fair 2000", Laser Force2001 Special Application
1st: "Pacless", LaserAnimation Sollinger
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2001 Technical Awards
2001 Fenning Award for Technical Achievement
Judges
Marc Gingras is a native of Montreal who grew up in the television and motion picture environment. He went to University to become a Physical Education Teacher. That lasted only 6 months and he went back to the entertainment industry. Marc started out making special effects for movies which, at the time, meant making fog and rain. He started MDG in 1979, making fog generators. He then discovered lasers in discotheques. When Marc looks at the evolution in fog and laser, he is still amazed by the technology of lasers and all of its applications. Marc is still in the fog and smoke after 22 years, and enjoys the different applications that he is confronted with every day.
Stephen R. Heminover is founder and president of Aura Technologies, Inc., and has been a major contributor to the growth and development of the laser display industry. He is a founding member of ILDA, has served as chair of ILDA’s Technical Standards Committee, organized ILDA’s first Advanced Technology Workshop in 1992, served as president of ILDA from 1992 through 1995 and is currently a member of the ILDA Board of Directors. Steve has been interested in laser technology since elementary school, and built his first laser as a high school project in 1968. As a student at the University of Illinois at Chicago, fate brought him to the Electronic Visualization Laboratory (EVL), a research lab specializing in interactive, real-time, computer graphics. Heminover wrote the first laser graphics programming language, the first-generation LGRASS, based on an early language by EVL Director, Dr. Thomas DeFanti. Both DeFanti and Heminover have continued to evolve their languages over the years, and still collaborate on various projects.
Greg Hughes saw his first laser show at the Bishop Planetarium in Bradenton, Florida, in 1980. The show was set to the music of Led Zeppelin and was performed by John and Linda Hare. From that moment he was hooked. He continued working as Technical Director for the Bishop Planetarium and South Florida Museum until 1995. Since then Greg has produced laser shows around the world, including fixed installations and touring shows with countless variations of laser hardware and software packages. He toured for three years with World Championship Wrestling, presenting live lasers on weekly TV broadcasts. Greg is currently producing and programming shows at Peachtree Laser in Atlanta, in addition to his technical duties. He has also served on both the ILDA Awards and Technical committees. Greg has enjoyed 20 plus years in the laser display industry and is looking forward to the rich future ahead.Technical Award winners
1st (tie): "Lasershow Converter Max", Pangolin Laser Systems
A “plug-in” that works seamlessly with 3D Studio Max to render laser frames that are faithful to the images created in the computer graphics program. Complex camera movements, character animations, and inverse kinematics—elements rarely found in laser shows but common in computer graphics—are captured by LCMax and instantly rendered in laser light.
1st (tie): "Schneider Showlaser", Audio Visual Imagineering and Schneider Laser Technologies
A solid-state, full-color laser that produces 10 watts of white-light power yet runs off a standard 220 volt outlet. The system’s high laser power is combined with other features: long lifetime, low power consumption and minimal cooling requirements. The Showlaser is the first high-powered solid-state laser to feature red, green and blue wavelengths and to offer a modulated, color-balanced palette designed for display purposes
2nd: "ScanMaster2 Laser Projector Control Board", Dirk Apitz
The ScanMaster2 connects an entire laser projection system to a client computer via standard Ethernet using TCP/IP. The board itself can be mounted in a projector, a standalone adapter box, or a recording/playback system. It comes with fully implemented ISP inputs, outputs and inputs for galvo positioning and monitoring, 8 color outputs and several I/Os connected to a 100MHz DSP with open source firmware. The system is powerful enough to do real-time interpolation of vectors and curves, geometric and color space processing, galvo safety monitoring and zone control.
3rd: "Lacon-5 Multimedia Workstation", LOBO electronic
The second-generation Lacon-5 multimedia laser workstation and show controller is ten times faster than its predecessor. The new Lacon-5 is based on a modular hardware structure that avoids data bottlenecks and allows for almost unlimited expansion. LOBO’s new high-resolution Scanline laser video feature can directly import video MPEG files (as well as all common bitmap file formats) and display rasterized laser output four times higher in resolution than other systems.
Honorable Mention: "LaserMAME", lasers.org
The LaserMAME technology takes its cue from the freeware MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator) software that allows modern PC’s to accurately reproduce vector-based arcade games popular in the early 1980s. But instead of playing these games on a computer monitor, LaserMAME allows the games to be played and projected in full-color laser light.
Honorable Mention: "Beam Brush - Dynamic Filtering Projection Technique", Laser Fantasy International
A small galvo-mounted filter that can be inserted fully or partially into the path of a laser beam. The filter gives an otherwise sharp beam a soft, more diffuse look, with the degree of softness varied by how far the filter is inserted into the beam path. Because filter insertion is controlled by a rapidly moving galvo, vector points within a laser graphic can be softened on an individual basis.-
2001 Awards videos on YouTube
There are three 2001 ILDA Awards videos at YouTube. Below is a listing of the start time of each winner.
ILDA Standard Projector (ISP) categories
ISP BEAM MODULE
00:01 - 1st - “Movement”, LOBO electronic GmbH
04:16 - 2nd - “The Bongo Show”, LaserAnimation Sollinger GmbH
08:15 - 3rd - “Operation Blade”, LaserAnimation Sollinger GmbH
ISP CEL ANIMATION (note: no audio for these)
12:12 - 1st - “Franky’s Night Out”, Audio Visual Imagineering, Inc.
13:06 - 2nd - “Indian Dance”, Laser Force, Inc.
14:27 - 3rd - “Dolphin”, LOBO electronic GmbH
14:53 - Hon. Mention - “Pegasus Morphs into a Jet”, Laser Force, Inc.
ISP COMPUTER ANIMATION (no audio)
15:18 - 1st - “Wolf Head”, Strictly FX
15:55 - 2nd - “Homero”, Lightspeed Design Group
18:27 - 3rd - “Pangolin ID”, Pangolin Laser Systems
18:50 - Hon. Mention - “Metamorphosis”, LaserAnimation Sollinger GmbH
19:29 - Hon. Mention - “Sea World”, Lightspeed Design Group
ISP GRAPHIC MODULE
20:05 - 1st - “La Vida Loca”, Strictly FX
23:51 - 2nd - “Belle Nuit”, LaserAnimation Sollinger GmbH
27:33 - 3rd (tie) - “Dead Man’s Party”, Audio Visual Imagineering, Inc,.
30:18 - 3rd (tie) - “One More Time”, Strictly FX
34:20 - Hon. Mention - “Rhapsody in Balloon”, Laser Force, Inc.
ISP GRAPHIC AND BEAM MODULE
38:22 - 1st - “Carol of the Bells”, Strictly FX
40:59 - 2nd - “Digital Get Down”, Audio Visual Imagineering, Inc.
43:56 - 3rd - “Music”, Audio Visual Imagineering, Inc. (no audio due to YouTube copyright claim)
47:04 - Hon. Mention - “Micro Maniac”, Laser Spectacles, Inc.Non-ISP categories
BEAMS/ATMOSPHERICS
51:12 - 1st - “Living Drums”, LOBO electronic GmbH
55:07 - 2nd (tie) - “Classglass”, LDS Light Design GmbH
(end of part 1 video)Non-ISP categories
BEAMS/ATMOSPHERICS
00:01 - 2nd (tie) - “Aurora”, LOBO electronic GmbH
ABSTRACT
03:51 - 1st - “Fight Song”, Laser Fantasy International
06:48 - 2nd- “New Year’s Day”, Audio Visual Imagineering, Inc.
GRAPHIC MODULE
10:57 - 1st - “LOBO 2001”, LOBO electronic GmbH
15:04 - 2nd - “The Sunshine Show”, LaserAnimation Sollinger GmbH
18:32 - 3rd - “Love at First Kiss”, Audio Visual Imagineering, Inc.
20:47 - Hon. Mention - “Spain - Rockin’ Gypsies”, Laser Fantasy International
23:49 - Hon. Mention - “Help”, Laser Force, Inc.
26:18 - Hon. Mention - “Fatal Destiny”, Laser Force, Inc.
INDOOR SHOW
30:18 - 1st - “Ostwürttemberg-Show”, LOBO electronic GmbH
34:33 - 2nd - “Proxi”, HB Laserkomponenten GmbH
38:07 - 3rd - “Citroën C5 Presentation”, Laser Entertainment S.R.L.
OUTDOOR SHOW
42:06 - 1st - “Nam June Paik’s Laser Art at Seoul Olympic Park”, Sam Laser Display (no audio)
45:52 - 2nd - “Mattel Pre-Toy Fair 2000”, Laser Force, Inc.
SPECIAL APPLICATION
49:51 - 1st - “Pacless”, LaserAnimation Sollinger GmbHFenning Award for Technical Achievement
FENNING AWARD FOR TECHNICAL ACHIEVEMENT
00:01 - 1st (tie) - “Lasershow Converter MAX”, Pangolin Laser Systems
03:51 - 1st (tie) - “Schneider Showlaser”, Audio Visual Imagineering, Inc. and Schneider Laser Technologies AG
07:51 - 2nd - “ScanMaster2”, Dirk Apitz (no video)
08:00 - 3rd - “LACON-5”, LOBO electronic GmbH
11:54 - Hon. Mention - “LaserMAME”, lasers.org
16:00 - Hon. Mention - “Dynamic Image Filtering Utilizing ‘Beam Brush’”, Laser Fantasy International (no video)
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