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Studentship studying image formation in film

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I hope this is within the rules of the forum - there is a commercial element to this post, but hopefully this is about giving someone the chance to do some exciting work!

I work at the National Centre for Computer Animation at Bournemouth University in the UK, and we've recently set up studentships, which will fund someone to study for four years at a postgraduate level, both at the University, and with an industrial partner, leading to a Doctorate.

One of the industrial partners involved is (Ilford) Harman, and working with them, we're hoping to develop improved simulations of latent image formation.

The applicant should have a BSc in computing, physics, chemistry, or similar engineering subject, with good programming skills. The fact you're reading this here means you're obviously interested in image making with film. It is a studentship, so you're not expected to be an expert already.

You need to be British (sorry - but it's funded by the UK government), but there is no catch: work for four years, on decent money (for a student), full time researching film!

If anyone is interested then contact me directly, and I'll answer any questions.

I hope there are at least a few people here that are as excited as I am about this, and if you're on of them perhaps you'll be working with me next year...

Thanks (and applogies if this breaks APUG rules - I am posting in good faith that this is something that members will be intersted in).

Ian Stephenson
ian at dctsystems.co.uk
 
Looks like a nice opportunity for some of the younger APUG members still needing to finish their studies... Hope you manage to find someone.

And it shows Harman's continued commitment for the foreseeable future... good to hear after all the talk in the "Harman price increases" thread...

Tom Kershaw said:
Does this imply that Harman is actually interested in developing "higher tech" products?

Tom
Click to expand...

Well, actually, if I remember well, Simon was recently talking about the development of a "lower tech" product instead ... It was the thread about the possible development of a "lith" type paper. According to Simon, it needed less, instead of more "high tech", to make a good lith paper, as the silver grains should be of varied form, contrary to the highly controlled emulsions as produced today by Harman.

Marco
 
WOW! wish I was British...and had a BS in engineering...was a skilled programmer...and well, lets just say I don't qualify . I hope you find a good who you are looking for, I figured this could use a bump.
 
I'm certainly interested in this sort of opportunity, but I'm an american. I just graduated with a BS in Chemistry. Does anyone know of any similar jobs in the US?
 
This is very cool. What a wonderful opportunity for someone. It would be double wonderful if it were and APUGer.
 
Harman is a good company, to be doing things like this and the Impossible Project. It's something to remember when we are tempted to bitch about the price of their products.
 
bump

I'm posting to update on this, and let everyone know that this studentship is still available. So far we've not found an appropriate applicant - it's not that we're rejecting a lot of people, but simply that we've not found anyone who is a good fit - good basic scientific/engineering background (BSc/BEng probably), and an enthusiasm for film.

In addition to the original posting, it's been clarified that to be elligible for full funding you must have been UK RESIDENT for three years, rather than being a UK national (more limited funding is available for EU nationals who have been EU resident). Full details of funding requirements, and other information is at www.digital-entertainment.org.

The official deadline for the current round of applications (to start in Oct 2010) is the 19th of March.

ian at dctsystems.co.uk
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Wish I was a UK resident... oh well, I hope you find someone
 
I would match the criteria and would also be interested, but unfortunately live in a wrong country . I'm sure they can find someone and there are definitely people who match the criteria at least lurking at APUG, if not active. Let's hope for the best; sounds like an interesting project.
 
As a side note:

Harman offers in Collaboration with The Center for Digital Entertainment at Bourmemouth University this research program


"Simulating Photographic Film for Animation and VFX"
 

What are the objectives of the improved computer simulations?

Jed
 
There are a number of practical applications (for example matching CG images, so they can be cut with footage shot on real stock), but ultimately I'm involved with it because I think film is interesting. The Harman guys are operating on a similar basis - they think it's worthwhile to develop and promote understanding of film, and get their name on publications in places like the ISJ.

There's a lot of theory about how film works, but with the approach we're using you can easily tweak one parameter of the simulated film, and actually SEE the results, rather than plotting an graph from an equation. Of course we make the graph too, by virtually exposing a step wedge, and measuring it with a virtual densitometer! The approach doesn't rely on to mathematical abstraction, but rather basic physical assumptions so it can test theories about film which would be hard to do with "real" experiments.

Ian
 
So, you are creating a modern computer model of silver halide crystals, how photons hit them, how the latent image forms and how the visible image develops? And then you could vary the parameters of emulsion and see how the resulting film changes sensitometrically? Did I understand it right?
 
more or less. There are plenty of good models for individual crystals, but it's much harder to extrapolate that to predict the behaviour of a real film at the scale of a whole negative. The work to do that in the past made lots of statistical assumptions, and broad mathematical approximations. It's now just about possible to simulate meaningful area of film on a per crystal basis, and see if the low level models actually lead to the emergence of large scale behaviours which we expect. If the simulated film behaves correctly, then the low level model is endorsed - if not, then we need to look to see whats missing.

Ian
 
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