12/14/07

Microfluidics Device


This was an interesting 3D project. I had to take a model that was created from data in a program called VMD that was then placed a 3D Program Blender and then convert to .obj file that Maya could read. Converting the .obj file to workable format in Maya took a while to get handle on, but it was worth it in the end. I got a pretty good rendering from Maya along with the control and adjustable-ity

12/4/07

Imaging steps in an X-Ray microscope

Richard Sandberg came to me asking for assistance with this designing this image for a potential PNAS publication cover. He came to me about 2 days before the deadline of the cover submission, so I just worked up what he had put together and gave it more professional touch. This image is not really cover type material and I explained to Richard how these editors at PNAS select their cover images. It is very hard designing covers for the type of research at JILA because the concepts are very complex and most of research hasn't been effectively visualized (nothing like medical field).

12/3/07

Laser Atom Trap Graphs


This was quick 3D project that had to be done in Maya because illustrator couldn't handle the 3d components very well. This was a very quick project where I had only about a day to complete in all. I believe Jun Ye uses this figure for a journal paper and presentations. I forgot the scientific details of these graphs.

11/20/07

DNA: Force Scale


The object of this image was to make a cover image that portrays tiny forces measurable via optical trap (atomic force microscopy). I worked with Tom Perkins who was doing research on the idea of using a double helix of DNA that acts as “spring” to measure the atomic forces. I imagined that best way to portray this scientific concept to a general audience was to design a compare and contrast metaphor to that of a traditional force spring scale that you would find in a physics class in a high school classroom.

I invited Jay Fittipaldi to work remotely with me on a few 3D components. He model the apple using Zbrush while I modeled and rendered everything else using Maya, Photoshop, and Illustrator. The team play with Jay helped me expand my experience with the Maya and Zbrush production pipeline.

11/7/07

Atomic Clocks Sync


I worked very closely with Jun Ye and Andrew Ludlow on this project. I really like working with Jun Ye because he lets me actually design a new perspective about how visually comprehend the subject. I stepped away from the more traditional design asethetics that you may see in Science magazine, and used colors and saturation levels to really make the illustration figure pretty distinctive. I wanted the image to be accessible to wide range of audiences such as the public to the international science communities. The image can be interpreted very technically with the details, but only when you really want to get into the details and break the image down to speceifics. Otherwise I still think the image is pretty clear with it over-all visual literacy that this how two very complex atomic clocks sync and relate to each other in Boulder.

This is illustration basically compares to two clocks (one at JILA and the other NIST) and how they relate to each. Essentially these two clocks are sync together or they are used to compare the times to help measure accuracy levels. The clocks are located in two different places in Boulder and they are connected to each via fiber optics cable that run underground. Basically this a compare n' contrast of two systems. Jun Ye wanted to use gears as metaphor for the system to describe the frequency comb spectrum. The arrangement and types of gears are actually very specific technically and in their arrangement in the figure. The JILA Research Highlight article explains this figure pretty well if you wanted more information

8/27/07

Excitons confined in quantum wells


This image is excitons confined in two-dimensional quantum wells inside a semiconductor. I worked closely with Sam Carter. We started off with multiple tangents about how to visualize this subject matter. I was working originally with Adobe Illustrator, but the discussion about the visuals quickly migrated to 3D schemes. I recently got my copy of Maya, and I thought it might be good project to work in Maya. The dots/spheres are very specifically arranged (mathmatically spaced from Matlab data) which reflect density and potential energy levels of the excitons. I was just very excited about making Maya be very detail oriented with the data and objects. Maya crashed a ton of times due to the heavy nature of the spherical geometry, but I got (3D) wise and converted all the polygon geometry to particle data which seemed to help with the computer processing. I didn't have my work horse Mac Pro yet and I only had my PC which basically only has good amount of memory and a 3d gamers graphic card (which mean slow slow when it comes to processing rendering and even displaying)

8/23/07

Jun Ye Photo Shoot


I had the pleasure of taking Jun Ye's photograph in front of his newly completed next-generation atomic clock. His lab is jam pack with lasers and multiple experiments running almost 24/7. I had to come to his lab in the early morning when non his experiments were not booting up to do their routines just yet. I brought my lights, but it was very difficult since there wasn't that much physical room in his lab and there were not many outlet plugs. But I got a good setup and Jun Ye was doing very good with me when I he posed for me.

8/17/07

Rosalba Perna Photo Shoot

I was asked to take photo's of several scientist that were 29th Street Community Outreach Activities. Rosalba Perna was one of the astrophysicist I needed to photograph, so I went to her office with my camera and lights. The shoot went pretty well

Mathis Weber Photo Shoot


I was asked to take photo's of several scientist that were 29th Street Community Outreach Activities. Mathis Weber was one of the scientist I needed to photograph, so I went to his lab with my camera and lights. The shoot went pretty well

8/10/07

X-ray Excitation


I worked very closely with Dr. Arvinder Sandhu and Etienne Gagnon on developing figures and cover art for Science Magazine. I had a week to develop a cover image using Maya as my 3D tool set.

My image was not selected for the front cover since Science magazine already used an attosecond science cover image in their previously issue. Apparently its Science’s political policy not to run similar subjects on their front covers consecutively. Even though it was not selected for the front cover image, it was printed on an inside page.

7/20/07

Optical 2-D Fourier transform spectroscopy of semiconductors


This was my first 3D project at JILA. I worked closely with Tianhao Zhang who wanted a cover image to be used for PNAS magazine. He came to me with some 3D renderings from Matlab which were too basic and limiting. So we worked together in figuring out how to import 3D information based on data samples from Matlab into Autodesk Maya. Basically there isn’t any function in Matlab for this need and I couldn’t find anybody in the Matlab or Maya communities that had any solutions. So Tianhao and I develop a Matlab script that created/formatted .obj files based off the data points. It worked and I was able to make some very good high resolution renderings using Maya.

7/15/07

EUV illustration and animation


I worked closely with Etienne Gagnon and Arvinder Sandhu who wanted an illustration and animation for their powerpoint presentation about using High-order Harmonics with Momentum Imaging Techniques to study atomic and molecular dynamics. They were basically presented their presentation internationally and need some really strong and clear visuals to supplement their talks.

This was one of my first laser schematics that I ever illustrated and also to animate as well. I used flash to make the animation, so that I could script in some controls for the presenters to utilize while they giving their talk (controls that let them start and stop and replay certain sections of the sequence again)

6/20/07

Attosecond Science & Coherent X-rays



I worked closely with Margaret Murnane and Dr. Oren Cohen on making this technical figure and animation. My goal was trying to keep technical side intact and make the concept accessible to a general audience as well.

6/5/07

JILA Machine Shop Course


My writer/boss wanted to make a JILA Light & Matter story about the machine shop course that is available to all employees at JILA, so I was the one who volunteer to take the course and also take photos for the story.

5/30/07

Reflection Grisms


Photo shoot of Ralph's laser reflection grisms.

5/11/07

Rolling Wheels & Friction


Ralph came to me asking to re-design a image he had for a text book that was going to be published in the following months. He told me he wanted a more visually clear image of the concept of how the rolling balls reach the bottom of the slop due to varied friction and uniform friction.

4/25/07

Casimir-Polder Force

This illustration and animation was designed to show how the casimir-polder force works on a quantum atomic level to a general audience.

4/15/07

Yotta Computer


The computing group at JILA asked me to take some photos of their new computer cluster they just designed called the Yotta computer. AMD donated 8 cutting-edge-dual-core processors which were used to build the ever growing Yotta computer cluster.

3/2/07

Breathing Cloud of ultracold fermions

This was one of my first animations/illustrations that I made at JILA. The animation is essentially a simulation that is driven by math equations and randomness algorithms using flash's actionscripting. Making this simulation was very similar to the animations and simulations that I had to make for my engineering course (Computer Simulations) using program called Processing (JAVA-based).