ABSTRACT

Various methods will be discussed that are used to describe dances, including specialised dance vocabularies, and Benesh and Laban notations.

The problems of representing dancing human figures by computer will be discussed. So far, this has been solved to the point of being able to maintain the five areas of contact between two ballroom dancing figures.

My work has so far culminated in the writing of a computer animation of the Australian New Vogue dance: the Merrilyn. It is hoped to demonstrate some computer animation of this work, and also give a live demonstration of New Vogue ballroom dancing for comparison (with permission of the Australian Dancesport Federation).

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

With degrees initially in Chemistry from Oxford, and after working for several years firstly in Satellite Communications and then Astronomy, Dr Herbison-Evans joined the Computer Science Department at the University of Sydney in 1971. Amongst other lecturing duties, he gave the first Computer Graphics course in Australia at that time, and has been teaching and doing research in Computer Graphics and Animation since then. He and his partner are New South Wales IDMA and ANDA "Over 50s" Champions in Standard Ballroom, Latin-American, and New Vogue dancing.

REQUIREMENTS