Hao Li

Hao Li is CEO and Co-Founder of Pinscreen, a startup that builds cutting edge AI-driven virtual avatar technologies. He is also a Distinguished Fellow of the Computer Vision Group at UC Berkeley. Before that, he was an Associate Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southern California, as well as the director of the Vision and Graphics Lab at the USC Institute for Creative Technologies. Hao's work in Computer Graphics and Computer Vision focuses on digitizing humans and capturing their performances for immersive communication, telepresence in virtual worlds, and entertainment. His research involves the development of novel deep learning, data-driven, and geometry processing algorithms. He is known for his seminal work in avatar creation, facial animation, hair digitization, dynamic shape processing, as well as his recent efforts in preventing the spread of malicious deep fakes. He was previously a visiting professor at Weta Digital, a research lead at Industrial Light & Magic / Lucasfilm, and a postdoctoral fellow at Columbia and Princeton Universities. He was named top 35 innovator under 35 by MIT Technology Review in 2013 and was also awarded the Google Faculty Award, the Okawa Foundation Research Grant, as well as the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Early Career Chair. He won the Office of Naval Research (ONR) Young Investigator Award in 2018 and was named named to the DARPA ISAT Study Group in 2019. In 2020, he won the ACM SIGGRAPH Real-Time Live! “Best in Show” award. Hao obtained his PhD at ETH Zurich and his MSc at the University of Karlsruhe (TH).

Education

• PhD Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich (2006 — 2010)
• MSc Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) (2000 — 2006)
• National School of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics of Grenoble (2002 — 2003)

Companies

• Distinguished Fellow / Visiting Scholar University of California, Berkeley (2020)
• CEO and Co-Founder Pinscreen (2015)
• Associate Professor (with Tenure) of Computer Science University of Southern California (2019 — 2020)
• Director of the Vision and Graphics Lab USC Institute for Creative Technologies (2016 — 2020)
• Assistant Professor of Computer Science University of Southern California (2013 — 2019)
• Visiting Professor Weta Digital (2014 — 2014)
• Researcher Industrial Light & Magic (2012 — 2013)
• Postdoctoral Fellow Columbia University (2011 — 2012)
• Visiting Postdoctoral Researcher Princeton University (2011 — 2012)

Awards

• DARPA ISAT Study Group Member (2019)
• ONR YIP, Young Investigator Award (2018)
• USC Stevens Commercialization Award (2017)
• Microsoft Academic Top 10 in Graphics Research (Rank #1) (2016)
• World Technology Award Fellow (2015)
• Andrew and Erna Viterbi Early Career Chair (2015)
• Okawa Foundation Research Grant (2015)
• Google Faculty Research Award (2015)
• C-Suite Quaterly NextGen 10: Innovators under 40 (2014)
• TR35, top 35 innovator under 35 by MIT Technology Review (2013)
• SNF fellowship for prospective researcher (2011)
• SCA best paper award 2009 (2009)