This is a busy time of year for those involved in preparing for the annual SIGGRAPH conference. One casualty has been the promptness of this issue of Computer Graphics. The combination of a larger than usual issue and a heavier than usual workload contributed to the delay. In producing the newsletter, we do share your concern for timeliness, especially publishing time-sensitive material such as calls for participation and deadlines. However, you will find several items of interest that I believe are worth the wait.

This issue introduces this ``From the Editor'' page with comments from the SIGGRAPH editor-in-chief and letters to the editor. Two inaugural letters appear here, one congratulating SIGGRAPH and the other raising some controversial concerns about SIGGRAPH and the art community. I urge you to read them both.

The major content of this issue is the report on the SIGGRAPH workshop on software tools for user interfaces. This workshop, sponsored by SIGGRAPH, was held in November 1986 to synthesize new ideas and directions for future research in user interfaces through discussion and interchange. The invited workshop produced four summary reports and several position papers. Dan Olsen chaired the workshop and collected the material published here. The manuscripts were delivered electronically and were copy-edited and reformatted for publication in Computer Graphics.

My significant concern for the quality of bibliographic citation of computer graphics research resulted in the article ``In-Citing Computer Graphics'' that appears in the SIGGRAPH Activities section. Coincidentally, Kelly Booth supplied an article about citations for many of the ``classics'' of computer graphics that are almost never cited in their original form; although these papers were presented at SIGGRAPH conferences they were published elsewhere in CACM or TOG.

The education committee continues to be active and has submitted a substantial education column on careers in computer graphics, complete with a questionnaire and a request for role model essays.

Continuing columns appear from Joe O'Rourke on computational geometry and from Jon Meads on standards activities.

If you want more technical substance to this newsletter, then Jim Kajiya has introduced a new column for you titled ``Graphics Goodies'' to publish small technical notes submitted in electronic form.

Other new material introduced in this issue includes tables of contents for issues 24 and 25 of the SIGGRAPH video review. We will index future issues of the SIGGRAPH video review in Computer Graphics on a regular basis, as we have done for the slide sets in the past few years. You should also know that new labels for your old issues of the SIGGRAPH video review are in preparation and will be available shortly. If you wish to get more information about these labels, contact Deborah Cotton, Single Copy Administrator, ACM, 11 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10030, (212) 869-7440.

I welcome your thoughts and comments on SIGGRAPH activities, especially its publications. You can reach me via the electronic mail address below or via the information in the masthead. SIGGRAPH is obviously a busy and vital organization. Thanks for making it so.

Richard J. Beach
SIGGRAPH Editor-in-chief
Beach.pa@Xerox.com

It has recently been brought to my attention that the SIGGRAPH'87 conference committee has decided to offer a set of 8" by 10" photographic enlargements of 4 computer graphics images for sale at the upcoming conference. These photographs are in lieu of a conference poster. As a long standing SIGGRAPH member who has been active for many years in the art show and related conference activities, I feel it is important to share with you my thoughts and concerns.

The issues of technical excellence, financial responsibility and esthetic judgment are the primary concerns of each conference committee. The individuals who comprise these committees have varying degrees of expertise in these areas. Success in each of these areas determines the success or failure of each conference. The individuals selected for the conference committees are all prominent professionals motivated to contribute their time and expertise for the good of SIGGRAPH.

It is my belief that the judgment of the conference committees is strongest in the technical areas and weakest in the esthetic sensibilities. The conference committees assign the selection and evaluation of technical papers to people with extensive knowledge of the areas covered by the papers. The judgments of this review committee are accepted without hesitation because they are educated professionals in the field. No one would ever say that their evaluations of the quality of either the writing or the research are ``just unsubstantiated matters of opinion.'' It is unthinkable that a conference committee would say that anyone, no matter what their background, is entitled to an equally weighted opinion in these matters, particularly in areas where those offering opinions have neither experience nor knowledge.

Nonetheless, these same arbiters of quality, with such high academic standards, repeatedly insult the art community by refusing to accept knowledgeable, educated opinions and suggestions from either these arts professionals, who are SIGGRAPH members, or reputable members of the traditional art world, even when these individuals have demonstrated by their hard work for SIGGRAPH their interests both in SIGGRAPH and in sharing their knowledge about art with computer graphics professionals.

In the interest of making money for their conference, the SIGGRAPH'87 conference committee has made certain decisions about matters concerning art and the exploitation of images created by artists and scientists. No one objects to SIGGRAPH conferences making money, quite the contrary. However, there are acceptable and unacceptable ways to exploit art. When the SIGGRAPH conference committee considers ways to produce revenues from art they should research in what ways reputable art institutions have done this in the past. Slides, posters and postcards are among the acceptable choices. It is my opinion that is is unacceptable to make photographs of art for sale. SIGGRAPH does not want to be in the business of making art for sale. Nor is it SIGGRAPH's intention to say to the world that these 8" by 10" photographs are what ``computer art'' is. Producing photographs of computer images results in a confusion of the promotional product with the artwork itself. The slide sets, which are an annual conference success, have clear educational value and are labeled with all the necessary information. Postcards are an excellent way of promoting all of the SIGGRAPH activities and were used successfully in the Japan SIGGRAPH art show of 1983. The decision not to have a poster this year is based on poor poster sales in the past. People love posters, so there must have been something wrong with some of the past SIGGRAPH posters if they did not sell well. Posters of quality and interest to conference attendees would certainly have sold.

The issues involved in creating a successful SIGGRAPH poster include the following:

In my opinion the most successful SIGGRAPH poster was the one in which an entire slide set was reproduced. My reasons are in part based on the fact that I have, over the years, seen this poster on so many office walls and in so many computer graphics laboratories. This poster has nostalgia value. It remains educationally valuable today. It shows how far the field has developed. Instead of making the mistake of using one or a few images to represent the whole field, everything is represented. The poster reads like a film strip. The poster's design makes the content more available to the viewer in contrast to posters where the design obscures the images. In the past SIGGRAPH has tried producing a variety of posters for each conference. I think that one really great poster is the best approach.

The issue of quality in promotional materials is an important one as it determines the financial success or failure of an item. When a SIGGRAPH conference committee looks at the previous years' failures they might realize that the cause of this is the obvious lack of quality and/or appropriateness for the audience of a specific item. This simple realization might lead this committee to find someone who has expertise in merchandising, computer graphics and design to supervise such items for sale. Expert opinion should be sought and heeded in these matters. It is common knowledge, particularly among academics and scientists, that expert opinions should be sought and new areas of knowledge researched before decisions are made. The SIGGRAPH conference committees are not going to reinvent the history of art. They might, however, learn the do's and don'ts in this field from members of the art community and from established art institutions and organizations.