I founded and directs the UH Computer Graphics and Interactive Media Lab, and co-directs the UH Computer Gaming Program. My research interests include computer graphics, computer animation, medical visualization, interactive media and gaming, human-centered computing, motion tracking, analysis and processing, and human computer interaction.

I am blessed to work with the following bright graduate students: Tanasai Sucontphunt, Xiaohan Ma, Qing Li, Chang H. Yun, Qin Gu, Nikhil Navkar, Binh Lehuy, and Peng-Chu Wang.

A partial list of current funded projects:

• "A Perceptual Metrics Guided Computational Paradigm for Expressive Talking Face Generation," (PI, funded by Texas Norman Hackerman Advanced Research Program)
• "Surgical Medical Data Visualization Algorithms," (PI, funded by the TMH-UH Collaborative Research Initiative and the Partner University Fund at France)
• "Graphical Algorithms for NeuroImages," (PI, funded by the Methodist Hospital Research Institute)
• "Tablet PC based Indexed Captioned Searchable Videos for STEM Coursework," (co-PI, funded by National Science Foundation)

Recent Publications      ( Full publication list )

"Perceptually Guided Expressive Facial Animation," Z. Deng and X. Ma, Proc. of ACM SIGGRAPH/Eurographics Symposium on Computer Animation (SCA) 2008, Dubin, Ireland, July 7-9, 2008, pp. 67-76.

"Compression of Human Motion Capture Data Using Motion Pattern Indexing," Q. Gu, J. Peng, and Z. Deng, Computer Graphics Forum (CGF), 27(9), Dec, 2008, (in press). Recommended by EG08 paper committee.

"Expressive Speech Animation Synthesis with Phoneme-Level Controls," Z. Deng and U. Neumann, Computer Graphics Forum (CGF), 27(6), September, 2008, (in press).

"Interactive 3D Facial Expression Posing through 2D Portrait Manipulation," T. Suconphunt, Z. Mo, U. Neumann, and Z. Deng, Proc. of Graphics Interface (GI 2008), Windsor, Ontario, Canada, May 28-30, 2008, pp. 177-184, also selected as one of cover images of the proceeding.

"Orthogonal Blendshape based Editing System for Facial Motion Capture Data," Q. Li and Z. Deng, IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications (CG&A), Nov/December, 2008, (in press).

"A Novel Visual System for Expressive Facial Motion Data Exploration," T. Sucontphunt, X. Yuan, Q. Li and Z. Deng, Proc. of 2008 IEEE Pacific Visualization Symposium (PacificVis 2008), Kyoto, Japan, March 5-7, 2008, pp. 103-110.

[Book] "Data-Driven 3D Facial Animation", Z. Deng and U. Neumann (Eds), Springer-Verlag Press, October 2007, ISBN: 978-1-84628-906-4.

"Online Motion Capture Marker Labeling for Multiple Interacting Articulated Targets," Q. Yu, Q. Li, and Z. Deng, Computer Graphics Forum (Proc. of Eurographics 2007), Prague, Czech Republic, September 2007, pp.477-483.

"Rigid Head Motion in Expressive Speech Animation: Analysis and Synthesis," C. Busso, Z. Deng, M. Grimm, U. Neumann, and S. Narayanan, IEEE Transaction on Audio, Speech, and Language Processing (TASLP), March 2007, 15(3), pp. 1075-1086.

"eFASE: Expressive Facial Animation Synthesis and Editing with Phoneme-Isomap Controls," Z. Deng and U. Neumann, Proc. of ACM SIGGRAPH/EG Symposium on Computer Animation (SCA 2006), Vienna, Austria, Sep 2-4, 2006, pp. 251-259.

"Animating Blendshape Faces by Cross-Mapping Motion Capture Data," Z. Deng, P.Y. Chiang, P. Fox, and U. Neumann, Proc. of ACM SIGGRAPH Symposium on Interactive 3D Graphics and Games (I3DG) 2006, Redwood City, CA, March 2006, pp. 43-48.

"Expressive Facial Animation Synthesis by Learning Speech Co-Articulation and Expression Spaces," Z. Deng, U. Neumann, J.P. Lewis, T.Y. Kim, M. Bulut, and S. Narayanan, IEEE Transaction on Visualization and Computer Graphics (TVCG), 12(6), Nov/Dec 2006, pp. 1523-1534.

"Automated Eye Motion using Texture Synthesis," Z. Deng J.P. Lewis, and U. Neumann, IEEE Computer Graphics & Applications (CG&A), 25(2), March/April 2005, pp. 24-30.

"Reducing Blendshape Interference by Selected Motion Attenuation" J.P. Lewis, J. Mooser, Z. Deng, and U. Neumann, Proc. of ACM SIGGRAPH Symposium on Interactive 3D Graphics and Games (I3DG), Washington DC, April 2005, pp.25-29.
 

Teaching

COSC 6397  "Advanced Game Development" (Spring 2008, Spring 2009)
COSC 6358  "Introduction to Interactive Game Development" (Fall 2007, Fall 2008)
COSC 6372  "3D Computer Graphics" (Fall 2007, Fall 2008)
COSC 6356  "Computer Animation and Simulation" (Spring 2007, Spring 2009)
COSC 4355  "Ubiquitous Computing" (Fall 2006), co-teach with Dr. Pavlidis.

Professional Services

Journal Editing:
Editorial Board, ACM Computer In Entertainment, (2008 - ).
Associate Editor, International Journal of Image and Graphics, (2009 - ).

Conference Committee and Organization:
Program Committee Member, IEEE Virtual Reality (VR) 2009 Conference.
Program Committee Member, IEEE International Conference on Computer Animation and Social Agents (CASA) 2009.
Program Chair, TexGraph 2008 Conference, Houston, TX, May 2008.
Program Committee Member, International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVA) 2008.
Program Committee Member, International Symposium on Visual Computing (ISVC) 2008.
Program Committee Member, IEEE International Conference on Computer Animation and Social Agents (CASA) 2008.
Program Committee Member, International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVA) 2007.
Program Committee Member, IEEE International Conference on CAD and Computer Graphics 2007.

Paper Reviewer for Journals: ACM Tran. on Graph. (TOG), IEEE Trans. on Vis and Computer Graph. (TVCG), IEEE Computer Graph. and Appl. (CG&A), Computer Graphics Forum (CGF), Graphical Models (GM), IEEE Trans. on Multimedia (ToMM), IEEE Trans. on Audio, Speech, and Language Processing (TASLP), Int'l Journal of Human-Computer Studies (IJHCS), Int'l Journal of Imaging Systems and Technology (IJIST) .

Paper Reviewer for Conferences: SIGGRAPH, Eurographics (EG), ACM Symp. on Interactive 3D Graphics and Games (I3DG), Symp. on Computer Animation (SCA), IEEE Visualization, ACM CHI Conf. on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI), Graphics Interface (GI), Computer Graphics Int'l (CGI), IEEE Virtual Reality (VR), Pacific Graphics (PG), Int'l Conf. on Artificial Reality and Telexistence (ICAT), Int'l Conf. on Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVA), Int'l Conf. on CAD/Graphics (CAD/Graphics), Int'l Conf. on Multimodal Interface (ICMI). .