25th Anniversary of the
Institute for Creative Technologies

Randall W. Hill, Jr. became the Executive Director of the USC Institute for Creative Technologies in 2006. A leader in understanding how classic storytelling and high-tech tools can create meaningful learning experiences, Hill steers the institute’s exploration of how virtual humans, mixed reality worlds, advanced computer graphics, dramatic films, social simulations and educational video games can augment more traditional methods for imparting lessons.  In addition to being ICT’s Executive Director, Randall Hill is a Vice Dean in the Viterbi School of Engineering and serves at the Omar B. Milligan Professor in Computer Science (Games and Interactive Media).

Mr. Douglas Tamilio is the ICT Executive Agent and the Director of the US Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Soldier Center (DEVCOM Soldier Center ). In this role, he is responsible for leading the planning, programming, coordination, and execution of the research, development, and engineering program dedicated to supporting and protecting the nation’s combat forces. This program focuses on providing functionally suitable food, clothing, airborne and airdrop equipment, tactical shelters, and organizational personal equipment to enhance soldier sustainment and readiness in combat situations.

Under Mr. Tamilio’s leadership, the US Army DEVCOM Soldier Center delivers world-class research, development, systems engineering, and services with a unique “Soldier”-centric focus. The center’s work is critical to ensuring the readiness and well-being of our nation’s combat forces, and Mr. Tamilio’s expertise and experience are essential to the center’s success.

As the 17^th United States Secretary of the Army, serving under President Bill Clinton, Louis Caldera performed the ribbon cutting that officially opened ICT 25 years ago. Caldera also served as the director of the White House Military Office from January to May 2009, and as a California State Assemblyman from January 1992 to January 1997.

Dr. Carol Folt serves as the twelfth president of the University of Southern California and holds the Robert C. Packard President’s Chair.
Known for always placing students at the center, she is a collaborative academic leader and an internationally recognized life scientist with faculty appointments in biological sciences, civil and environmental engineering, and population and public health sciences.

Yannis C. Yortsos is the Dean of the USC Viterbi School of Engineering and the Zohrab Kaprielian Dean’s Chair in Engineering, a position he holds since 2005.  As dean of engineering, he articulated in 2008 the concept of Engineering+, positioning engineering as the enabling discipline of our times, and has been actively engaged in the effort to “change the conversation about engineering”. 

Randall W. Hill, Jr. became the Executive Director of the USC Institute for Creative Technologies in 2006. A leader in understanding how classic storytelling and high-tech tools can create meaningful learning experiences, Hill steers the institute’s exploration of how virtual humans, mixed reality worlds, advanced computer graphics, dramatic films, social simulations and educational video games can augment more traditional methods for imparting lessons.  In addition to being ICT’s Executive Director, Randall Hill is a Vice Dean in the Viterbi School of Engineering and serves at the Omar B. Milligan Professor in Computer Science (Games and Interactive Media).

Dr. Ishwar K. Puri is senior vice president of research and innovation and professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering at University of Southern California with affiliate appointments as professor of chemical engineering and materials science and professor of biomedical engineering. As a leader of academic research and education, he oversees the USC Office of Research and Innovation that administers and guides the university’s research, commercialization and entreprenuership programs.

Randall W. Hill, Jr. became the Executive Director of the USC Institute for Creative Technologies in 2006. A leader in understanding how classic storytelling and high-tech tools can create meaningful learning experiences, Hill steers the institute’s exploration of how virtual humans, mixed reality worlds, advanced computer graphics, dramatic films, social simulations and educational video games can augment more traditional methods for imparting lessons.  In addition to being ICT’s Executive Director, Randall Hill is a Vice Dean in the Viterbi School of Engineering and serves at the Omar B. Milligan Professor in Computer Science (Games and Interactive Media).

As the 17^th United States Secretary of the Army, serving under President Bill Clinton, Louis Caldera performed the ribbon cutting that officially opened ICT 25 years ago. Caldera also served as the director of the White House Military Office from January to May 2009, and as a California State Assemblyman from January 1992 to January 1997.

Cheryl Birch is on the Leadership team at USC Institute for Creative Technologies and has been at ICT since 2000, joining not long after it was formed. Previously, she was Vice President, Business Affairs, Universal Studios, where she negotiated deals for many series including “Murder, She Wrote” and “Quantum Leap” before moving to Paramount Pictures as Vice President, Business Affairs, in their network television division, to do the same for the “Star Trek” series, and many more. AT ICT, Cheryl had to combine the flexible financial practices of Hollywood with the strictly regulated federal funding practices of the government.  She also built a business infrastructure that enabled ICT to be efficient and responsive to proposing work, helping to hire staff, make purchases, and monitor the progress of research projects.  Her proudest accomplishment was learning that her business office team was considered one of the most well-regarded at USC.

General Kern graduated from West Point in 1967 with a Bachelor of Science degree. He holds Master Degrees in Civil and Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan and was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2006. He was a National Security Fellow at the J.F. Kennedy School, Harvard University and was a member of the Defense Science Board for 15 years.

Dr. James Thomas Blake, who served as ICT’s inaugural Program Manager,  has had a remarkable 50 year career as a military officer, academic researcher, government official, and industry leader. He is a noted expert in modeling, simulation, and training, as well as government acquisition.

William Swartout is chief science officer at the USC Institute for Creative Technologies, providing overall direction to the institute’s research programs. He is also co-Director of the Center for Generative AI and Society and a research professor in the Computer Science Department at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering.

Swartout has been involved in cutting edge research and development of artificial intelligence systems throughout his career. In 2009, Swartout received the Robert Engelmore Award from the AAAI for seminal contributions to knowledge-based systems and explanation, groundbreaking research on virtual human technologies and their applications, and outstanding service to the artificial intelligence community. Swartout is a Fellow of the AAAI, has served on their Board of Councilors and is past chair of the SIGART of the ACM.

Louis-Philippe-Morency (LP) is tenure-track Faculty at CMU Language Technology Institute,  where he leads the Multimodal Communication and Machine Learning Laboratory (MultiComp Lab).
LP’s  research focuses on building the computational foundations to enable computers with the abilities to analyze, recognize and predict subtle human communicative behaviors during social interactions. His  multi-disciplinary research topic overlaps the fields of multimodal interaction, social psychology, computer vision, machine learning and artificial intelligence, and has many applications in areas as diverse as medicine, robotics and education.

Stacy Marsella’s multidisciplinary research at Northeastern University is grounded in the computational modeling of human cognition, emotion, and social behavior, as well as the evaluation of those models. Beyond its relevance to understanding human behavior, the work has seen numerous applications, including health interventions, social skills training, and planning operations. His applied work includes frameworks for large-scale social simulations of towns and a range of techniques and tools for creating virtual humans, facsimiles of people that can engage in face-to-face interactions.

Paul Debevec is the Director of Research, Creative Algorithms and Technology at Netflix and Adjunct Research Professor of Computer Science in the Viterbi School of Engineering at the University of Southern California, working within the Vision and Graphics Laboratory at the USC Institute for Creative Technologies.

H. Chad Lane’s lab at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign develops educational technologies that captivates learners, young and old, and helps cultivate attitudes towards learning and growth that are compatible with the demands of the modern world. In pursuit of these goals, Chad conducts research on the design, use, and impacts of intelligent technologies for learning and behavior change. This work involves blending techniques from the entertainment industry (that foster engagement) with those from artificial intelligence and intelligent tutoring systems (that promote learning), as well as running studies to better understand whether and how the resulting learning experiences impact learners.

Mark Bolas is a research scientist, artist, and designer exploring perception, agency, and intelligence. His work focuses on creating virtual environments and transducers that fully engage one’s perception and cognition, and create a visceral memory of the experience. Amongst his courses at the undergraduate and graduate level are the design for interactive media and the business of interactive media.

Dava Casoni is the Executive Producer for the Force Writers Room and the Chief Legal Advisor for the University of Southern California’s Institute for Creative Technologies (“ICT”). After attending Boston University on a U.S. Army R.O.T.C scholarship, she was commissioned as a 2LT in the U.S. Army Reserves Transportation Corps. With expertise in intellectual property, technology, finance, foreign national threats, export controls and related regulatory regimes, she has been a State Department appointee to the Defense Trade Advisory Group since 2011. Creatively, Dava is a Screen Actors Guild/American Federation of Television and Radio Artists voice-over artist. She holds a B.A. in political science and a B.S. in management from Boston University as well as both a J.D. and LLM from Cornell Law School.

Ric Arthur leads a double-life as a writer and senior naval officer. Ric has written for several TV shows including The Last Ship, NCIS, Hawaii Five-O. He’s also produced a variety of indie projects including Laura Smiles with RKO Pictures. Still active in the Navy Reserve, Ric is the National Security Fellow for the Truman National Security Project. Ric has completed multiple tours to East Asia, served as UN Peacekeeper in the Western Sahara and aboard the USNS MERCY in Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia and the Philippines. Ric is originally from Pasadena, California is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and has a Masters in Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School.

Mr. Douglas Tamilio is the ICT Executive Agent and the Director of the US Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Soldier Center (DEVCOM Soldier Center ). In this role, he is responsible for leading the planning, programming, coordination, and execution of the research, development, and engineering program dedicated to supporting and protecting the nation’s combat forces. This program focuses on providing functionally suitable food, clothing, airborne and airdrop equipment, tactical shelters, and organizational personal equipment to enhance soldier sustainment and readiness in combat situations.

Under Mr. Tamilio’s leadership, the US Army DEVCOM Soldier Center delivers world-class research, development, systems engineering, and services with a unique “Soldier”-centric focus. The center’s work is critical to ensuring the readiness and well-being of our nation’s combat forces, and Mr. Tamilio’s expertise and experience are essential to the center’s success.

Lance “Pink” Floyd, CDR, USN (ret), is the Director for Air Dominance & Strike at Anduril, specializing in naval kill chains, weapons, and systems. He previously served as Chief Engineer at the Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division, China Lake, and trained the first F-35 integrated fires AIRWING. Pink is a retired Test Pilot and Strike Fighter pilot with over 3,500 hours in F/A-18s and flight experience in 26 different aircraft types. He flew combat missions with VFA-137 and VFA-192 in Japan and served as a test pilot at VX-23, VX-31, and VX-9. He holds a Master’s in Aeronautical Engineering from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School and a Bachelor’s in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin. Pink was commissioned in 1988 after graduating from Aviation Officer Candidate School.

Mr. Stephen Ryan is the Director & Chief Engineer for Multi-Domain Solutions at Northrop Grumman, specializing in air-space integration and next-generation space systems. He co-authored the textbook “Activity-Based Intelligence” and is a leading expert in ABI at Northrop Grumman. Previously, he was an intelligence analyst at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), focusing on terrorism in Afghanistan. Mr. Ryan has received multiple awards, including the Joint Civilian Service Commendation Award and the NATO Medal. He holds advanced degrees in Systems Engineering from Johns Hopkins and Security Studies from Georgetown, along with a B.A. in International Affairs from George Washington University.

Sale Lilly is a Senior Policy Analyst at the RAND Corporation, focusing on Chinese military and economic analysis, and wargame design. Lilly previously served as an officer in the U.S. Navy and as management consultant in the financial service industry. Lilly holds degrees from the United States Naval Academy (B.A. Economics), and dual degrees from Oxford University (M.Sc. in Modern Chinese Studies, M.Phil. in Economic and Social History).

General (ret) Robert Brown is an experienced commander who has led at every level, from platoon through Army Service Component Command.  Serving as Commanding General of U.S. Army Pacific, General Brown led the Army’s largest service component command responsible for 106,000 Soldiers across the Indo-Pacific Region before his September 2019 retirement.

One of only three coaches to win a Super Bowl and a college football national championship, Pete Carroll spent 14 years as head coach and executive vice president of the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks. His brand of inclusive leadership, combined with his ability to create an “atmosphere of understanding” within teams, has made him one of the most recognizable and respected figures in modern sports and beyond. He empowers his players to be the best version of themselves, with the freedom to make mistakes, speak their minds, and be truly seen and heard for who they are.