This is more computer graphics than vision but the videos on Ron Fedkiw’s home page are simply amazing.
Fedkiw received his Ph.D. in Mathematics from UCLA in 1996 and did postdoctoral studies both at UCLA in Mathematics and at Caltech in Aeronautics before joining the Stanford Computer Science Department. He was awarded the National Academy of Science Award for Initiatives in Research, a Packard Foundation Fellowship, a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), a Sloan Research Fellowship, the ACM Siggraph Significant New Researcher Award, an Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Program Award (ONR YIP), a Robert N. Noyce Family Faculty Scholarship, two distinguished teaching awards, etc. Currently he is on the editorial board of the Journal of Computational Physics, Journal of Scientific Computing, SIAM Journal on Imaging Sciences, and Communications in Mathematical Sciences, and he participates in the reviewing process of a number of journals and funding agencies. He has published over 80 research papers in computational physics, computer graphics and vision, as well as a book on level set methods.
For the past six years, he has been a consultant with Industrial Light + Magic. He received screen credits for his work on “Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines” (liquid terminator, explosions, cloth), “Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith” (explosions, cloth, flesh), “Poseidon” (water) and “Evan Almighty” (water). Uncredited work includes “The Patriot” (smoke), “The Mummy Returns” (smoke), “Jurassic Park III” (smoke), “Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones” (cloth), “Dreamcatcher” (smoke), “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl” (wine), “Van Helsing” (flesh), “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events” (flesh), “War of the Worlds” (cloth), “The Island” (cloth), “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” (dragon fire, cloth), “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” (flesh), “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest” (tentacles, flesh, water, cloth), “Eragon” (flesh), “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” (tentacles, flesh, water, cloth), “Transformers” (articulated and rigid bodies) and “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” (cloth, water).
Check out the video for one of the impressive demos from Ron’s site…