Vol. 54, Issue 3, Summer 2013 1st Prize (still image excerpt). Alexey Kashpersky from Poltava, Ukraine. http://kashpersky.com Biology inspires Art. Alexey writes, “I have expressed in this work the pain, suffering and fear of the In This Issue: unknown, which with inconceivable paradox, goes hand in hand with physical beauty, light, and feelings of love and passion.” Alexey has recently started working at Thomas Direct Studios. Feature Columns: Announcing the Winners of the autoPACK Visualization autoPACK Visualization Challenge2012: Present HIV in Blood Plasma Challenge 2012 ......... 1 By Graham Johnson, PhD, CMI Candidates for President For years I’ve studied the artwork posted developed as part of my PhD thesis) could Elect and the Board of on CG Society (a popular website and dis- generate reliable cell-scale models Governors . 3 cussion forum for digital artists who work assembled with molecular details, and we primarily in the 3D, film and game indus- had refined its Graphic User Interface Techniques ............. 9 tries, www.cgsociety.org). I dreamed of (GUI) enough to make autoPACK suitable Book Review ........... 12 what molecular worlds might look like for public use. when visualized with the diverse skill With planning and funding support from Vesalius Trust .......... 13 sets represented across both the AMI and Chris Andrews and Carlos Olguin of Events & Notices ........ 17 CG Society’s ~200,000 members. By late Autodesk, I designed a contest to 2012, the autoPACK software (originally challenge participants to explore the mys- and much more... (Cont'd on page 3) From the Newsletter Team We're diving right into our summer issue We also announce the 2013 Inez Demonet with this year's fantastic line-up of Scholar, Natalie Koscal, who gives us candidates for the Board of Governors some insight into her future aspirations. election. Each nominee brings a unique Catherine Au-Yeung, an inspired first set of talents to the organization, so year student from Toronto, shares her please take some time to read their experience of the tri-school exchange motivational statements and cast your hosted at Hopkins. Graham Johnson vote! We also hear from our President- announces the winner of the autoPACK Committee Chair & Co-Editors Elect, Cory Sandone, whose talents, Visualization Challenge, Jenn Belanger Jodi (Chapman) Slade & Shizuka Aoki experience, and ambitions leave us brings us important upcoming events, and inspired. Christy Krames gets us geared up for the Vice Chair & Graphic Design Leslie Leonard We fill you in (particularly the newer 2013 AMI Meeting with details about the AMI members!) on the AMI Fellowship conference and Salt Lake City. Editorial Review Board Anne Erickson program and how to earn those oh-so- We hope you enjoy this issue and, as Margot Mackay mysterious Fellow points. Michelle Davis always, we’d love to hear any feedback or Cory Sandone provides a comprehensive look at how to requests (written or drawn!). Feature Editors make a complex-branching neuron using The Newsletter Team, Rachel Bajema ZBrush and FiberMesh. We’re also Jennifer Belanger introduced to the world of graphic novels Lydia Gregg Wendy Beth Jackelow in a special edition of the quarterly book review by Wendy Beth Jackelow with Contributors Catherine Au-Yeung Lydia Gregg and Wendy Hiller Gee. Michelle Davis Marcia Hartsock brings us updates on the Shizuka Aoki, Leslie Leonard & Jodi Marcia Hartsock hidden gems of the Vesalius Trust (Chapman) Slade Jane Hurd Collection of Art in the Service of Graham Johnson Christy Krames Science from the Lloyd Library. Executive Director Melanie Bowzer Newsletter Submission Guidelines Online Posting If you are interested in submitting All materials for the Fall 2013 newsletter Sara Zach material or would like to speak with us must be submitted by Monday, August The Association of Medical Illustrators and ask questions, please contact us with 26th, 2013. assumes no responsibility for statements your ideas at: [email protected] We’re Like to doodle or cartoon? We’d love to reflecting the opinions submitted by looking for a half page to a full page or individual members published in the AMI include these and other small sketches in News. The AMI News (ISSN # P-179) about 750 words per article on topics of our newsletter. Please send your images serves as a forum for the thoughts of its your choice. Accompanying image files to the address above if you’re interested members as well as a vehicle for reporting must be 350 dpi, no smaller than 2.5" x in having them published. Images must news events and the proceedings of the 2.5". Association’s committees. be 350 dpi for color or tone and 1200 dpi for B/W line, no smaller than 2.5" x 2.5". Postmaster, send address changes to: Association of Medical Illustrators Letters and Comments AMR Management Services 201 E. Main St., Ste. 1405 We'd love to hear your thoughts on our Lexington, KY 40507 Digital version of AMI Newsletter features, please email us (newsletter@ available in the Online Members Letters Policy ami.org) or send mail to the AMR Community (OMC) Library: Letters printed in the AMI News do not address to the left. necessarily reflect the editorial position of http://community.ami.org the AMI News or the opinion of the Association of Medical Illustrators. Letters should be sent via e-mail to the editor, must be exclusive to the AMI News and must include the writer’s full Non-Sequitor name, address and daytime telephone The Great Salt Lake number. The editorial review board of the The Great Salt Lake is the largest natural lake west of the Mississippi River. It is roughly 75 miles AMI News reserves the right to condense letters. long and 35 miles wide, but it is quite shallow, with an average depth of 13 feet, and its deepest point is 34 feet. 1.1 million tons of minerals are deposited in the lake each year by its tributaries. As it has no outlet (besides evaporation), it has very high salinity - far saltier than sea water - and its mineral content is constantly increasing. The Great Salt Lake is too salty to support fish and most other aquatic species, but brine shrimp and several types of algae do live in the lake. 2 AMI News, Summer 2013 terious world of HIV. Ludovic Autin and I supplied contestants with several choices of 3D models of HIV floating in blood plasma. The more complex models contained hundreds of thousands of molecular components that contestants interacted with via a standardized autoPACK GUI running in Cinema 4D, Maya, and Blender. To broaden the user- base, in the 11th hour Autin worked day and night with Christopher Diggins of Autodesk to provide a GUI for 3D Studio Max, followed by Soft Image and PMV. In February, Tom Goddard added support for Chimera. Ultimately, in an official CG Society art contest (http://autopack. cgsociety.org/) run by Ballistic media, I challenged the participants “to convey humanity's complex relationships with HIV, be they emotional, political, or intellectual.” I further asked them “to 2nd Prize (still image excerpt). Jiri Klusak from Svitavy, Czech Republic. [email protected] excite general audiences with visuals In a very tight race for 1st place, Biomolecular chemis Jiri Klusak tamed and expanded the autoPACK that will help our labs spread interest models with his own optimizations and packings to submit an epic physiological poster describing a in the search for a cure.” portion of the HIV life cycle. Jiri writes, “The goal was to depict my inner vision of a dynamic and crowded molecular landscape and AutoPACK really convinced me [that it is] an awesome tool for this purpose.” The contest accomplished several major goals for the autoPACK project and fell incorporate specific tasks we want to Please visit http://autopack.cgsociety.org short on others. Biologists improved the accomplish as part of the challenge itself, to enjoy, discuss, and study all of the accuracy of the models via a dynamic e.g., to have a prize for “most improved entries. database to help merge cutting edge lipid packing algorithm.” Visit http://www.autopack.org/cellpack- science with top quality art. Many entries On a small-scale outreach level, the challenge2012 to watch for future chal- demonstrated how artists and illustrators contest introduced many artists who’d lenges, learn how the software can help could spend more time researching and never heard of a “lipid” to the fascinating researchers, or to learn more about the planning stories and exploring aesthetics realm of cell biology. Exposing this structure of HIV. with the obstacles of modeling reduced. group to tools like autoPACK, ePMV, To truly improve the quality of the autoPACK developed by: Graham mMaya, and BioBlender should have a 1,2 2 models, however, we must lure more Johnson & Ludovic Autin , Mostafa broader impact by improving the 2 2 researchers to critique and adjust the Al-Alusi , David Goodsell , Michel accuracy of molecular depictions in film 2 2 model input parameters. We hope that Sanner & Art Olson and TV. In turn, we in the AMI can learn providing a portal to “see” their improve- 1 techniques and approaches for molecular Mesoscope Lab in qb3@UCSF ments in realtime or through the eyes of visualization and story-telling from the (California Institute for Quantitative artists will excite more researchers to “Hollywood” style artists or find new Biosciences, University of California, participate in the future. While the collaborators for big production projects. San Francisco) general packing solutions provided by Perhaps most exciting, the open aspect of 2Molecular Graphics Lab at The Scripps autoPACK should interest other indus- the challenge inspired extreme artistic Research Institute, La Jolla tries (e.g.