Cottalango Leon (born 1971)Alum Profile. (2016).
Mr. Cottalango(1992 BE-CSE), an Alumnus of PSG College of Technology getting Award from OSCAR Academy.

PSG College of Technology PSG College of Technology is an autonomous, government aided, private engineering college in Coimbatore, India. It is affiliated with Anna University. It is affiliated to PSG and Sons Charities Trust. Among engineering colleges in India, PS ...

. Retrieved 12 February 2016. is an Indian-American

computer graphics Computer graphics deals with generating images with the aid of computers. Today, computer graphics is a core technology in digital photography, film, video games, cell phone and computer displays, and many specialized applications. A great de ...

technician who won the

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

for scientific and technical achievement jointly with Sam Richards and J. Robert Ray in 2016.News. (2016).
Techie, born in T.N., wins Academy Award. M. Soundarya Preetha. ''

The Hindu ''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It began as a weekly in 1878 and became a daily in 1889. It is one of the Indian newspapers of record and the secon ...

''. Retrieved 8 Feb 2016.Official Awards Notification. (2016).
11 Scientific and technical achievements to be honoured with Academy Awards. ''

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS, often pronounced ; also known as simply the Academy or the Motion Picture Academy) is a professional honorary organization with the stated goal of advancing the arts and sciences of motio ...

''. Retrieved 8 February 2016. Leon won the Academy Award for "the design, engineering and continuous development" of

Sony Pictures Imageworks Sony Pictures Imageworks Inc. is a Canadian visual effects and computer animation studio headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, with an additional office on the Sony Pictures Studios lot in Culver City, California. SPI is a unit of Sony Pi ...

itView technology, a digital 3D film review

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated software documentation, documentation and data (computing), data. This is in contrast to Computer hardware, hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. ...

.Imageworks Library (2007).
itView annotation tools (3.6.3.4). Sony Pictures Animation, Inc. ''Surf's Up: The making of an animated documentary''. Retrieved 10 February 2016.News. (2016).
Academy Honors 33 Individuals With Scientific and Technical Awards. Dave McNary, Film Reporter. ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

''. Retrieved 8 February 2016. Leon worked on the itView technology for eight years as the chief contributor. Schooled in India, Leon is an Arizona State University alumnus. He has worked at Sony Pictures Imageworks since 1996, and has contributed to the making of several commercially successful films, including the '' Spider-Man (2002 film series)Spider-Man film series'' and the '' Men In Black film series''.

Early life and family

Leon was born at his mother's family residence in

Thoothukudi Thoothukudi (formerly Tuticorin) is a port city, a municipal corporation and an industrial city in Thoothukudi district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. The city lies in the Coromandel Coast of Bay of Bengal. Thoothukudi is the capital and he ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a state in southern India. It is the tenth largest Indian state by area and the sixth largest by population. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu is the home of the Tamil people, whose Tamil language ...

in 1971. Both his parents – mother Rajam Mariasingam and father Loorthu – were primary school teachers. When Leon was young, his parents moved from the south of

to Coimbatore.Interview. (2016).
Of Indian origin, Oscar winner Cottalango Leon says opportunities in India are better than ever. Keyur Seta. Times News Network. ''

The Times of India ''The Times of India'', also known by its abbreviation ''TOI'', is an Indian English-language daily newspaper and digital news media owned and managed by The Times Group. It is the third-largest newspaper in India by circulation and largest ...

''. Retrieved 9 February 2016.Indians Abroad News. (2016).
Indian-Origin Technician Cottalango Leon Wins Oscar. J Sam Daniel Stalin. ''

NDTV New Delhi Television Ltd is an Indian news media company focusing on broadcast and digital news publication. The company is considered to be a legacy brand that pioneered independent news broadcasting in India, and is credited for launching t ...

''. Retrieved 8 February 2016. Leon's early years were spent in this city – a place he still visits every two years.Entertainment News. (2016).
Tamilian Wins Oscar for Science and Technology. Anushree Madhavan. ''

The New Indian Express ''The New Indian Express'' is an Indian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper published by the Chennai-based Express Publications. It was founded in 1932 as ''The Indian Express'', under the ownership of Chennai-based P. Varadarajulu Naid ...

''. Retrieved 9 February 2016. Leon attended the Government High School at Kallapalayam, a village in the Sultanpet Block of Coimbatore.Government map. (undated).
Taluk Information. Coimbatore: Sultanpet Block. TWAD Board. ''

Government of Tamil Nadu Government of Tamil Nadu is the subnational government for the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is seated at Fort St George, Chennai. The legislature of Tamil Nadu was bicameral until 1986, when it was replaced by a unicameral legislature, l ...

maps''. Retrieved 10 February 2016. After studying here till grade VII, he studied from grade VIII to grade XII at Kadri Mills High School in Coimbatore.News. (2013).
The famous five. Akila Kannadasan. ''

''. Retrieved 10 February 2016.Current Affairs. (2016).
Cottalango Leon selected for 2016 Technical Achievement Award of Academy of Motion Pictures. ''Jagran Josh''. Retrieved 9 February 2016. During his childhood, Leon became interested in the subjects of mathematics and

science Science is a systematic endeavor that Scientific method, builds and organizes knowledge in the form of Testability, testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earli ...

, and also developed, as per him, a keen interest in "the visual aspect of movies". Subsequently, Leon attended college at the

from 1988 till 1992, completing his

Bachelor of Engineering A Bachelor of Engineering (BEng) or a Bachelor of Science in Engineering (BSE) is an academic undergraduate degree awarded to a student after three to five years of studying engineering at an accredited college or university. In the UK, a Ba ...

degree in

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to practical disciplines (includi ...

. He completed his M.S. in computer science from Arizona State University in 1996, specialising in

. Leon married Roopa in 2001. Roopa also belongs to southern Tamil Nadu, having lived there till her marriage to Leon. The couple have a daughter Shruthi and live in Culver City.News. (2016).
Cottalango Leon, another Indian-origin technician, wins Oscar. Keyur Seta. Times News Network. ''

''. Retrieved 8 February 2016.

Career

After graduating, Leon joined the

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament Ho ...

firm Softek LLC and worked with them for two years till 1994. As per Leon, during this time, he became inspired by '' Jurassic Park'' after watching the film and decided to pursue his career in the technologies used in its making. After completing the master's degree at Arizona State University in 1996, Leon worked for a short time as a

video game programmer A game programmer is a software engineer, programmer, or computer scientist who primarily develops codebases for video games or related software, such as game development tools. Game programming has many specialized disciplines, all of which fall ...

with

DreamWorks Interactive Danger Close Games (formerly DreamWorks Interactive LLC and EA Los Angeles) was an American video game developer based in Los Angeles. The company was founded in March 1995 as joint venture between DreamWorks SKG and Microsoft (later moved to Mi ...

, before joining Sony Pictures Imageworks in 1996, where he continues working to date, currently holding the position of Principal Software Engineer. At Imageworks, as per Leon, he was asked to develop an improved digital film review software as an alternative to a then existing software. Leon released the initial version within two months of having been assigned the job; after receiving positive feedback from the artists using the software, Leon kept updating various functionalities of the software over the years. This digital 3D film review software, itView, led Leon to get an Academy Award in 2016. Leon mentions working alone on the project for many years, and that he was over time given a team when the project achieved significant growth. In a 2016 media interview, Leon says that he worked on the itView technology for eight years as the chief contributor. To date, Leon has worked on several commercially successful films, including ''

Stuart Little ''Stuart Little'' is a 1945 American children's novel by E. B. White. It was White's first children's book, and it is now widely recognized as a classic in children's literature. ''Stuart Little'' was illustrated by the subsequently award-winnin ...

'', the '' Spider-Man (2002 film series)Spider-Man film series'', the '' Men In Black film series'', '' Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs'', ''

The Smurfs ''The Smurfs'' (french: Les Schtroumpfs; nl, De Smurfen) is a Belgian comic franchise centered on a fictional colony of small, blue, humanoid creatures who live in mushroom-shaped houses in the forest. ''The Smurfs'' was first created and int ...

'', ''

Hotel Transylvania ''Hotel Transylvania'' is an American animated media franchise created by comedy writer Todd Durham and produced by Sony Pictures Animation. It consists of four feature films, three short films, a flash-animated TV series, and several video ...

'', and '' Open Season''.

2016 Academy Award

Leon, at the age of 44, won the 2016 Academy Award for scientific and technical achievement for "the design, engineering and continuous development" of

itView technology. In a ceremony held on 13 February 2016 at Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, California, Leon received the Academy Award jointly with Sam Richards and J. Robert Ray.Entertainment News. (2016).
WATCH: Rahul C. Thakkar and Cottalango Leon, who are of Indian origin, given Oscar Technical Achievement awards. Dominic Ferrao and Keyur Seta. ''Times News Network,

''. Retrieved 16 February 2016. As per the Academy, these set of awards are bestowed upon individuals who have contributed significantly over time – and not necessarily in the past year – to the motion picture industry. Richard Edlund, Chair of the Scientific and Technical Awards Committee at the

praised the "outstanding, innovative work" of awardees, adding that their contributions "have further expanded filmmakers’ creative opportunities..." The Academy's award citation praised itView's

API An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how ...

plugin and varied functionalities, mentioning that "itView provides an intuitive and flexible creative review environment that can be deployed globally for highly efficient collaboration." Leon said that "the award was not totally unexpected" but that it felt "good to be recognised by the Academy and the wider industry."

Notes

References

External links