The sounds of mambo and the taste of gumbo provided the flavor for siggraph 2000, the annual conference of the computer graphics and interactive industries, attended by more than 25,000 at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Centre June 23-28 in New Orleans.

The event, sponsored by acm siggraph, a community of industry professionals, featured a trade show from June 25-27, with more than 300 exhibitors displaying their latest software, hardware and services in the realm of 3D modeling and rendering, motion capture, 3D Web solutions, visual effects and hdtv.

Twenty-five Canadian companies exhibited at the event, including Alias|Wavefront, Matrox, Miranda, Side Effects Software, Softimage and Toon Boom. Montreal-headquartered Discreet previewed 3D studio gmax, a new technology that will provide consumers with their own personal tools to create new levels of interaction and individualized characters for popular game titles.

Toronto-based Forefront Graphics provided siggraph tv/Online with live 20-minute reports from the siggraph tv studio twice daily. These reports included interviews, reviews of events, technology updates and the conference buzz. The reports were distributed to viewing lounges throughout the convention centre.

Expanding companies such as Mainframe Entertainment used the conference as an opportunity for talent recruitment. The Vancouver producer of cgi-animated tv programming, which recently opened a motion-capture studio for upcoming projects Heavy Gear and Action Man, was looking to fill multiple positions for animators and modelers with Softimage experience. *