Steven Schkolne (born 1976 in Cape Town, South Africa), inventor of

speedcabling Speedcabling is a competitive sport. Steven Schkolne devised the sport, which originated in the United States. In the standard rules, competitors are challenged to separate a mass of either six or twelve tangled Cat 5 Ethernet cables in the fa ...

, is a

South African American South African Americans are Americans who have full or partial ancestry from South Africa. As of 2012, there were approximately 80,000 people born in South Africa who were living in the United States (according to the OECD). As of 2019, there w ...

computer scientist A computer scientist is a person who is trained in the academic study of computer science. Computer scientists typically work on the theoretical side of computation, as opposed to the hardware side on which computer engineers mainly focus (al ...

inventor An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...

, and digital artist.

Biography

Schkolne was born in Cape Town and moved to the United States as a child. During high school he attended North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics. Later he earned his BS from

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...

. Schkolne went on to obtain his

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

in Computer Science at Caltech where he pioneered foundational methods for drawing in 3D or virtual reality environments.

Surface drawing

Schkolne's graduate work at Caltech resulted in the first fully functional drawing program for virtual reality. The program, an early precursor to Google's Tilt Brush, was shown at

SIGGRAPH SIGGRAPH (Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques) is an annual conference on computer graphics (CG) organized by the ACM SIGGRAPH, starting in 1974. The main conference is held in North America; SIGGRAPH Asia ...

in 1999. The program captured hand movements and translated them into digital strokes. Schkolne worked in collaboration with BMW's

Designworks Designworks is a global creative consultancy owned by BMW and based in Santa Monica, California, United States. Designworks has two further studios, in Munich, Germany and Shanghai, China. Established independently in 1972 by Charles Pelly, it ...

to use Surface Drawing as a platform for creating conceptual prototypes.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schkolne, Steven 1976 births Living people People from Cape Town South African emigrants to the United States California Institute of Technology alumni Carnegie Mellon University alumni American computer scientists Computer graphics researchers Digital artists