Highlights:

* Traditional research joined by new production and "meta" paper categories
* March 15, 2010 regular papers deadline
* Extended April 2, 2010 deadline for research papers rejected from SIGGRAPH 2010
* A special issue of the Computers and Graphics journal will feature extended NPAR papers
* NPAR will be a joint session with SBIM in Annecy, Fr during the animation festival
* Submit papers at https://cmt.research.microsoft.com/NPAR2010/
* More information at http://graphics.cs.williams.edu/sbim-npar10
* Updated 2010-01-26: Production and Meta papers should not be anonymous.
* Updated 2010-02-25: SIGGRAPH resubmissions are not required to submit abstracts ahead of time

We invite you to submit your work to NPAR 2010, the 8th international symposium dedicated to non-photorealistic animation and rendering, sponsored by ACM SIGGRAPH and in cooperation with Eurographics. This year NPAR returns to its traditional home in Annecy, France. It will be at the 50th anniversary Annecy International Animated Film Festival and will be held in joint session with the Sketch Based Interfaces and Modeling workshop.

Non-photorealistic animation and rendering (NPAR) refers to computational techniques for visual communication. Such techniques usually generate imagery and motion which is expressive, rather than photorealistic, although they may incorporate realistic elements. We invite researchers, artists, and practitioners of all areas connected to non-photorealistic animation and rendering to submit papers and posters on their work. Submitted papers should be self-classified into one of the following three categories, each of which has its own reviewing standards:

* Research: new algorithms, scientific studies, analysis, or data (i.e., traditional NPAR papers) These must contain novel results that make a substantitive contribution to the field. NPAR has a special extended deadline for technical papers that were also submitted to SIGGRAPH 2010. Authors of accepted research papers are encouraged to follow up on their work in a special issue of the Computers and Graphics journal dedicated to extended NPAR papers. This is an opportunity to tackle outstanding issues raised by reviewers, address discussions and comments at the conference and present additional details and results.
* Production: candid discussion of the process of creating a work (e.g., film, image, game) or art tool (e.g., paint or CAD program, software library).
* Meta: statements about research that do not contain new results, e.g.: grand challenges, position papers, evaluation standards, surveys, and primers on art/aesthetics/psychophysics for a computer science audience.

All work must be previously unpublished and contain a novel contribution. Production and Meta papers need not contain original research or results.
Topic areas of the conference include but are not limited to:

* Expressive character animation and physics
* Abstraction and stylization of images/video
* Interaction techniques
* Accounts of real productions (e.g., animated films)
* NPAR in real software products (e.g., modeling, visualization, presentation software)
* Visual composition
* Hardware acceleration
* Evaluation methods for NPAR algorithms
* Psychophysics of NPAR
* Rendering and layout for text and presentation graphics
* Quantitative analysis of human artists
* Generative or evolutionary approaches
* Style transfer
* Temporal and spatial coherence
* Adapting classic CG effects like motion blur, depth of field, and lighting for NPAR
* Simulation of natural media and traditional styles
* Non-traditional camera models
* Position papers on grand challenges

Paper submissions should be at most 9 single-sided color pages in length and follow the ACM SIGGRAPH sponsored conference formatting instructions, including a title page with an abstract and keywords, and a bibliography. For the first time, this year the bibliography will not count towards the page limit. The submission is electronic in PDF format; supplemental video and images may also be submitted. Research papers should be anonymous when submitted because they will have a double-blind review. Production and Meta papers should not be anonymous. Their review will be single-blind and the author's reputation and institution are a factor that reviewers may consider.

The accepted papers will be published in the conference proceedings by ACM SIGGRAPH and will be available online via the ACM Digital Library. Posters will not be archived. Posters may be submitted in PDF format as either an extended abstract or a a draft of the poster itself. All paper submissions will automatically be considered for poster presentation as well.
Submission

* Papers:
o Go to https://cmt.research.microsoft.com/NPAR2010/ to create your paper submission.
o Author instructions: http://www.siggraph.org/publications/instructions.pdf
o 'acmsiggraph' LaTeX class files: http://www.siggraph.org/publications/acmsiggraph.zip
o Authors of accepted papers will need to complete and deliver the ACM Copyright Form to Stephen Spencer. It is available from http://www.siggraph.org/publications/sponsoredconf.pdf
* Posters: E-mail your extended abstract or poster draft to npar2010posters@gmail.com.

Important Dates
Note that the NPAR and SBIM paper submission and review processes are independent although the conference are held jointly.
All deadlines are at 23:59 (11:59 pm) GMT.

Full papers deadline: March 15, 2010* (see exemption for works submitted to SIGGRAPH 2010 below)
SIGGRAPH-submitted papers deadline: April 2, 2010*
Papers acceptance notification: April 5, 2010
Posters deadline: April 5, 2010
Papers camera-ready deadline: April 12, 2010
Posters acceptance notification: May 1, 2010
Conference: June 7-10, 2010

* The extended "SIGGRAPH" deadline allows authors who have work rejected from SIGGRAPH 2010 to have an opportunity to improve their papers and submit them to NPAR 2010. If you submitted a technical paper to SIGGRAPH 2010 and would like to also be considered for publication at NPAR, make the following submissions:

1. March 15, 2010: (Optional) Submit an extended abstract, e.g., the first page of your SIGGRAPH submission), and your pre-rebuttal SIGGRAPH reviews. This is explicitly permitted by the SIGGRAPH dual submission rules. We ask but do not require that you submit the abstract and reviews so that we have advance warning on how many papers we'll be reviewing. You may also use this as an opportunity to ask the NPAR chairs for advice. Keep in mind that our goal is to help prepare your work for publication, not to criticize it.
2. April 2, 2010: Submit a complete paper, your complete SIGGRAPH reviews, and a cover letter explaining how you improved your paper to address issues in the reviews. Think of this as the second round of a journal review process. Sometimes no changes are necessary--if the reviewers found the paper "not of general interest" or of "minor impact" for the SIGGRAPH community, the narrower NPAR audience may still find the technique valuable. Note that in other cases minor textural changes may greatly strengthen the paper. For example, simply removing a contentious section, extending the related work discussion, or making the contribution clearer in the introduction.

Three reviewers will reconsider the revised paper and the original reviews in the light of any changes you made. Note that if your paper was accepted at SIGGRAPH you must withdraw from consideration of the same work at NPAR.

Conference Chairs: Morgan McGuire (Williams College) and John Collomosse (University of Surrey)
Posters Chairs: Jan Eric Kyprianidis (Hasso-Plattner-Institut) and Holger Winnemöller (Adobe Systems Inc.)