Computer Graphics and Game Technology

Interactive entertainment and computer-animated visual effects are now part of our mainstream culture. Sixty percent of all Americans older than the age of six, or about 145 million people, currently play video games, making the game industry larger than the film industry in terms of gross revenues. In addition, many of the most popular films today (e.g., the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Master and Commander, Pirates of the Caribbean, Finding Nemo) owe a large part of their success to the quality and believability of the digital special effects. The dramatic expansion in television and HDTV channels, the maturity, usability and economic viability of digital effects software technology, and the apparent audience demand for fantasy, science fiction and historical reconstruction content are pushing increased digital effect material into television productions. Creating such computer-generated imagery, however, is no trivial task. It requires a delicate blending of art with technology by teams of highly skilled professionals, including artists, animators, writers, designers, engineers and software developers working long hours with advanced software tools.

By offering a Master’s program in Computer Graphics and Game Technology (CGGT), Penn Engineering exposes recent graduates, as well as students returning from industry, to state-of-the-art graphics and animation technologies, as well as interactive media design principles, product development methodologies and engineering entrepreneurship. The program prepares students for positions requiring multi-disciplinary skills such as designers, technical animators, technical directors and game programmers. Says Associate Dean Norm Badler, “CGGT is the graduate degree program for those who yearn for visible results, tangible fulfillment, and cutting-edge opportunities.”

Currently there are very few graduate programs at major research universities that balance theory with practice in order to prepare students for cutting-edge work in the computer animation, special effects and game industries. Penn Engineering’s Master’s program in Computer Graphics and Game Technology was created specifically to address this need and complements other graphics-related programs at Penn at both the undergraduate level (Digital Media Design, see www.dmd.upenn.edu) and the research level (Center for Human Modeling and Simulation, see hms.upenn.edu ).