James F. O'Brien is a

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

researcher and professor of

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

and

electrical engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems that use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

. He is also co-founder and chief science officer at Avametric, a company developing software for virtual clothing try on. In 2015, he received an award for Scientific and Technical Achievement from the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.

Education

O'Brien received a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

in 1992 from

Florida International University Florida International University (FIU) is a public research university with its main campus in Westchester, Florida, United States. Founded in 1965 by the Florida Legislature, the school opened to students in 1972. FIU is the third-largest univ ...

. He then did his graduate work under the supervision of Dr. Jessica Hodgins at

Georgia Tech The Georgia Institute of Technology (commonly referred to as Georgia Tech, GT, and simply Tech or the Institute) is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Established in 1885, it has the lar ...

's GVU Center. He received his

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''doctor'', meaning "teacher") or doctoral degree is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism '' licentia docendi'' ("licence to teach ...

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

from the

Georgia Institute of Technology College of Computing The College of Computing is a college of the Georgia Institute of Technology, a Public university, public research university in Atlanta, Georgia. It is divided into four schools: the Georgia Institute of Technology School of Computer Science, ...

in 2000 for a thesis entitled ''Graphical Modeling and Animation of Fracture''.

Research and professional activities

O'Brien has published research papers on topics such as

surface reconstruction Surface reconstruction refers to the process by which atoms at the surface of a crystal assume a different structure than that of the bulk. Surface reconstructions are important in that they help in the understanding of surface chemistry for variou ...

, human figure animation, mesh generation, physically based animation, surgical simulation, computational fluid dynamics, and fracture propagation. O'Brien served as a consultant on the development of the game physics engine

Digital Molecular Matter Digital Molecular Matter (DMM) is a proprietary middleware physics engine developed by Pixelux for generating realistic destruction and deformation effects. The offline version can support high-resolution simulations for use in film special effect ...

(DMM). To date, this game engine has been used in '' Star Wars: The Force Unleashed'' and an off-line version of it was used for special effects in the film ''

Avatar Avatar (, ; ) is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means . It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appearance" is sometimes u ...

Sucker Punch A sucker punch (American English), also known as a cheap shot, coward punch, one-punch attack, or king-hit (Australian English), is a punch thrown at the recipient unprovoked and without warning, allowing no time for preparation or defense on t ...

Source Code In computing, source code, or simply code or source, is a plain text computer program written in a programming language. A programmer writes the human readable source code to control the behavior of a computer. Since a computer, at base, only ...

, X-Men: First Class'', and more than 60 other feature films. In 2015, his work on developing DMM was recognized by the

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 in Beverly Hills, California, U.S., with the stated goal of adva ...

with a Technical Achievement award. The citation reads: "''To Ben Cole for the design of the Kali Destruction System, to Eric Parker for the development of the Digital Molecular Matter toolkit, and to James O’Brien for his influential research on the finite element methods that served as a foundation for these tools. The combined innovations in Kali and DMM provide artists with an intuitive, art-directable system for the creation of scalable and realistic fracture and deformation simulations. These tools established finite element methods as a new reference point for believable on-screen destruction.''"

UC Berkeley

He joined

UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after the Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkele ...

's Computer Science department as a faculty member in 2000. Prof. O'Brien runs the Berkeley Computer Animation and Modeling Group and his research focuses primarily on

physically based animation Physically based animation is an area of interest within computer graphics concerned with the simulation of physically plausible behaviors at interactive rates. Advances in physically based animation are often motivated by the need to include compl ...

3D modeling In 3D computer graphics, 3D modeling is the process of developing a mathematical coordinate-based Computer representation of surfaces, representation of a surface of an object (inanimate or living) in Three-dimensional space, three dimensions vi ...

, and audio simulation.

Photo forensics and fake media detection

Prof O'Brien is a noted expert on detection and analysis of fake images and video. He has frequently worked with news organizations on exposing fake or altered photographs, as well as images created by

generative artificial intelligence Generative artificial intelligence (Generative AI, GenAI, or GAI) is a subfield of artificial intelligence that uses generative models to produce text, images, videos, or other forms of data. These models Machine learning, learn the underlyin ...

software. His methods have been used to expose fabrication of medical research records prosecute child pornographers, validate evidentiary videos, and rule out conspiracy theories relating to photographs of the Moon landing. In response to their work debunking assertions that the shadows in photos of the 1969

Moon Landing A Moon landing or lunar landing is the arrival of a spacecraft on the surface of the Moon, including both crewed and robotic missions. The first human-made object to touch the Moon was Luna 2 in 1959. In 1969 Apollo 11 was the first cr ...

and of

Lee Harvey Oswald Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was a U.S. Marine veteran who assassinated John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, on November 22, 1963. Oswald was placed in juvenile detention at age 12 for truan ...

, coauthor Hany Farid has been accused by conspiracy theorists of being a time-traveling CIA operative. In addition to developing methods for detecting fake images and video, O'Brien's has studied the impact of fake media on viewers and investigated what factors contribute to a viewer's acceptance or skepticism regarding the media they consume. Prof. O'Brien has stated that due to rapid progress in

machine learning Machine learning (ML) is a field of study in artificial intelligence concerned with the development and study of Computational statistics, statistical algorithms that can learn from data and generalise to unseen data, and thus perform Task ( ...

"it will be impossible to tell the difference between a generated image and a real one" and that detection software will be in an arms race that will eventually be lost to generative AI. He advocates for changing societal attitudes regarding trusting media and that viewers should suspect everything as potentially fake.

Awards

SIGGRAPH SIGGRAPH (Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques) is an annual conference centered around computer graphics organized by ACM, starting in 1974 in Boulder, CO. The main conference has always been held in North ...

Impact Award (1999) *

Technology Review ''MIT Technology Review'' is a bimonthly magazine wholly owned by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It was founded in 1899 as ''The Technology Review'', and was re-launched without "''The''" in its name on April 23, 1998, under then pu ...

TR100 (2004) *

Sloan Fellowship The Sloan Research Fellowships are awarded annually by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation since 1955 to "provide support and recognition to early-career scientists and scholars". This program is one of the oldest of its kind in the United States. ...

(2004) * College of Engineering Distinguished Alumni,

(2006) * GVU 15 Impact Award * Jim and Donna Gray Endowment Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching (2008) * The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences Award for Scientific and Technical Achievement ( A Sci-Tech Oscar, 2015 ) * Dreamworks Animation award for Technical Achievement for work in the field of Machine Learning related to Character Rigging (2020)

References

External links

Home page at U. C. Berkeley

Computer Graphics Group at U. C. Berkeley

Berkeley Computer Animation and Modeling Group

Author profile in ACM Digital Library
{{DEFAULTSORT:Obrien, James F. Computer graphics professionals Living people Georgia Tech alumni Year of birth missing (living people) Florida International University alumni UC Berkeley College of Engineering faculty Christopher Columbus High School (Miami-Dade County, Florida) alumni