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Running Streams
18/11/05
View more images from William Latham's inaugural lecture
William Latham, Running Stream Professor in Creative Technology, with Innovation North, delivered his inaugural lecture entitled ‘Mutation Art, Computer Games and Business’ drawing on his own experiences from when his career began in 1987 through to the present day.
William originally trained as an artist at Oxford University, graduating with a BA in Fine Art in 1982, before being awarded an MA by The Royal College of Art in 1985. Following an early interest in evolution he then began to work with computer graphics.
William is well known for his pioneering work in evolutionary art and computing at the IBM UK Scientific Centre in Winchester, which he carried out between 1997 and 1993. He is co-author of “Evolutionary Art and Computers” published in 1992, which covers his work with the mathematician Stephen Todd.
His award-winning organic computer animated films have been shown at SIGGRAPH and at many computer graphics events around the world. He has also toured the UK, Germany, Australia, Hong Kong and Japan for four years with major art exhibitions. His work with Stephen Todd resulted in a number of IBM patents. During this period his work also attracted national and international press coverage, appearing in publications such as Scientific American and New Scientist, arts magazines, computing magazines and newspapers - including The Telegraph, The Guardian, The Sunday Times, Le Monde (France) and Ashahi Shimbun (Japan).
In 1993 William founded Computer Artworks Ltd and was the company's Chief Executive until 2003. After initially working with the Music Industry for two years, Computer Artworks went on to focus on producing computer games for Playstation 2, Xbox and PC. Hit games included the award-winning ‘The Thing’ for Universal Studios, a sequel to the cult John Carpenter film of the same name. The game was a number one hit in the UK and Germany. At Computer Artworks William negotiated and closed a number of major contracts, valued between $500K and $5m, with, amongst others, Microsoft USA, Nokia, Atari, Virgin and SONY.
In 2003 William founded Games Audit Ltd, an Operational and Technical Due Diligence company focussing on games companies and related sectors. Games Audit clients range from banks, VCs and city investment companies and include Ingenious, IDGVE Ventures, ITI Techmedia, Add Zero Ltd and Imprimatur Ltd.
