Dr. Sam Leinhardt will speak on

"Having an Eye, Seeing the Vision"

Digital Imagers Meeting

Sunday Sept. 2, 2007 at 1:15, Pitt Scaife Hall, Room 1102

Description:

I will focus on the need for developing a sensitive eye with which to previsualize final images: how to see extraordinary image opportunities in the ordinary, capture them as working data using a digital camera, and then bring the final image to realization using digital editing techniques.

Bio:

Sam Leinhardt is a semiprofessional photographer and has had his images published on the Adobe website and in photographic print magazines including PRO Digital Imaging and Rangefinder.

His career as Entrepreneur, Scientist and Educator includes the following:

After research at Harvard and the MIT Slone School, he founded his first company, Leinhard-McCormick Associates (LMA) in 1976, to provide computer-based tools for interactive exploratory data analysis and data mining.

FORMTEK, Inc., his second company, was spun out of Carnegie Mellon University’s CAD Graphics Laboratory in 1982. FORMTEK developed and marketed CAD systems for industrial engineering and utilities mapping applications. It was acquired by Lockheed Martin in 1989. Leinhardt remained at Lockheed Martin as a Vice President until December 1997.

STORM, LLC, the third company Leinhardt co-founded, commenced operations in 1998, to develop and market Internet infrastructure software. It was acquired by Redleaf Group in June 2000.

Leinhardt’s fourth company, Eizel Technologies, Inc., developed real-time content repurposing software for handheld mobile devices, based on artificial intelligence, machine vision and machine learning research conducted at CMU. Nokia acquired Eizel and Leinhardt remained as Vice President until 2004.

Leinhardt’s fifth company, Penthera Technologies, Inc., was founded in 2005. Penthera provides infrastructure software for broadcast mobile video.

Leinhardt’s BA (1965), MA (1967) and PhD (1968) degrees are from the University of Chicago. As an undergraduate, he participated in the development of the Explorer 9 satellite’s onboard instrumentation. Thereafter he focused on the application of mathematical and statistical methods in sociology, economics and public policy. He pioneered the development of stochastic digraph theory and its use in social network analysis. He was a Social Science Research Council Post Doctoral Fellow in Mathematical Social Science and lecturer in quantitative methods at Harvard University and was the recipient of grants and fellowships from the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation. He was a Professor in CMU’s Graduate School of Industrial Administration (now the Tepper School) and its School of Urban and Public Affairs (now the Heinz School). He has taught at the University of Pittsburgh, and multiple foreign Universities.

Leinhardt is the author and editor of numerous academic books, articles and journals in sociology, economics, econometrics, and mathematical statistics, and is currently Adjunct Professor of Computer Science in CMU’s Human Computer Interaction Institute (HCII). He was a Director of Innovation Works, an agency funded by the State of Pennsylvania to provide seed funding to high tech startups and is a Venture Partner at ITU, a venture capital firm focused on the commercialization of technology developed at major US research universities. He is an active private investor and advisor to several high tech startups.