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2026: A Geek’s Guide to a Possible Inflection Year

Life, Miscellaneous, Science, Technology / By

2026: A Geek’s Guide to a Possible Inflection Year

(An optimistically conditional field guide to space, science, technology, culture, and the quietly strange year ahead.)

Space: The Return of Continuity

2026 may be remembered less for spectacle than for normalization. With Artemis II, humanity returns to the Moon not as a one-off stunt, but as part of a sustained program. Even a simple crewed lunar flyby matters: it validates deep‑space systems, radiation exposure models, and long-duration operations.

Meanwhile, heavy‑lift launch vehicles —especially SpaceX’s Starship— continue to bend the economics of access to orbit. Whether flawless or messy, their existence forces a rethinking of what missions are considered “reasonable.”

Things to watch: • Routine reuse of super‑heavy launch systems • Lunar communications relays and navigation experiments • Smallsats dedicated to space‑weather prediction • Early groundwork for lunar resource prospecting

The key signal: space slowly becoming boring, reliable infrastructure.

Cosmology: When Data Starts Arguing Back

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory and Euclid usher in a statistical era of cosmology. These instruments don’t rely on single spectacular discoveries; they overwhelm theory with data.

Possible pressure points: • The Hubble tension either resolving—or becoming impossible to ignore • Weak‑lensing maps challenging assumptions about dark matter distribution • Persistent anomalies that survive replication • Early hints that dark energy may not be constant over time

Most revolutions in physics begin as bookkeeping problems. 2026 is when the ledgers get very large.

AI and Computation: From Novelty to Infrastructure

By 2026, AI stops being impressive and starts being embedded.

Expected shifts:

• AI‑assisted discovery pipelines in chemistry, biology, and materials science • Autonomous labs running experiments continuously • Journals revising authorship rules to account for machine contribution • Regulation focusing on liability and accountability rather than hype

The deep change is epistemic: knowledge generation becomes partially opaque by default.

Games and Virtual Worlds: Scale, Persistence, Meaning

Light No Fire: planet-scale fantasy, shared geography.

Hello Games’ Light No Fire represents a cultural counter‑movement: a single, shared, planet‑scale world rather than infinite procedural sprawl. If it succeeds, it signals a renewed appetite for persistence and place.

Other signals: • “Slow games” emphasizing exploration and systems • Increased overlap between game engines and architecture • Virtual worlds used for education and scientific visualization

Games continue to function as rehearsal spaces for complexity and cooperation.

Art, Media, and Expression in a Machine Age

By 2026, AI‑assisted art is no longer controversial—it is contextual.

Trends to watch: • Explicit hybrid authorship • Spatial and volumetric storytelling • Constraint as an artistic signal • Generative systems treated as living exhibits

Art adapts to abundance by becoming selective. The question shifts from how to why.

Society and the Background Hum

  • No single societal rupture is expected. There will no doubt be drama, flashpoints and tensions of an increasing rate of change. But I’m going to be optimistic and suggest this will not be a year of large-scale disruption. Instead: • Climate adaptation becomes everyday governance • Aging demographics reshape infrastructure • Hybrid work stabilizes into norms
  • Urban design quietly prioritizes resilience
  • Economic uncertainty expresses as exploratory priority shifts
  • World powers waffle, trying to find their balance between ambition and existential angst

These changes define decades, not headlines.

Small Signals That Matter

Watch for: • Conferences dominated by null results • Funding shifting toward data curation • AI failures blamed on infrastructure, not models • Space missions framed around logistics, not heroics

Small signals often precede large reorganizations.

2026 may not deliver fireworks (fingers crossed!) Its significance lies in synchronization: tools mature, data accumulates, and systems collide with reality. For those paying attention, it’s a year rich in phase transitions. As Kurzweil might point out, the singularity is near: expect to see the very structure of our world begin to shift.

Change is good. And change is also terrifying. Keep. Creating.

2D Graphics, 3D Graphics, Creative Work, Film, VFX / By

I’ve been a bit frustrated with this site for a while, because there’s all this fascinating work I do at Meta Reality Labs, that I’d really love to share. While I know many people are reeling under the changes from AI technology as well as the difficult time both game and visual effects creatives have been facing as everything changes beneath us… Please don’t think I’m unsympathetic (or unaffected) when I say this: there has never been a more exciting time to work in CGI.

“Exciting” and “challenging” go together. It means we are in a period of great change. But I’ve found over the years that these are the kind of times when people also tend to do their most meaningful work. This is one of those points when reputations (and fortunes) are made, and when new paradigms and possibilities abound.

If you’re a professional struggling to find work or establish relevance in a world which may not demand some of your formerly most attractive skills, allow me to suggest that you step back a moment and remember that you ARE still relevant. Yes a toddler can now seemingly generate an image or video that would only have been possible through great effort just a few years ago, or vibe code an application that formerly took a team of engineers. All that means is that YOU can do the same, as well as so much more, by leveraging your less obvious skills which have now become massively relevant.

– Eye for quality and detail. – Understanding of process principles to achieve top results. – Industry understanding of tools, methods, ways to approach challenges and visualize your end goals early. – Discipline to slog through difficulties to get to somewhere extraordinary.

You may not be able to do the work you’ve spent decades doing. But that doesn’t mean you lack value. Do NEW stuff. Ride this wave, and go further, faster than you ever dreamt was possible. Or, to be a bit more militaristic in tone: Adapt. Overcome.

Change is struggle. But it’s also opportunity. Figure out where your brass ring is, and reach for it.

Update: It’s all about AI these Days

2D Graphics, 3D Graphics, AI, Creative Work / By

Ok, it’s been some time since I last posted. That is due in part to the fact that much of the work I’m doing for Meta Reality Labs is NDA’d and even the work I do in my personal time often touches on what I’m focusing on at work. I wish I could show off some of the stuff I’ve gotten into recently, it’s pretty amazing.

Here are a few thoughts. The world which has emerged is one of increasing rate of change. For Game Devs, VFX professionals and Technical Artists this change is almost overwhelming. AI is capable of generating astounding visuals in seconds from a simple prompt, as well as models, code, and even entire games. I see this generating a lot of angst 

and fear, and it certainly has changed the recruiting and hiring side of things.

But this kind of change has happened before. The emergence of CGI transformed filmmaking. Computer networks transformed all of

 society. The emergence of digital tools for artists decimated the once huge numbers of “draftsmen” working in architecture, construction and a host of other fields. In recent decades we have seen a LOT of change. Video killed the radio star, and then video on demand killed television, at least to the extent of replacing those media from their seemingly (at the time) unassailable positions as king of the hill.

Today influencers vie with A-listers for viewership, movie box office releases and television series compete for consumer attention with on-demand series, game titles, and social media.

Change is scary and disruptive.

But it can also be astoundingly beneficial. Artists of all kinds shouldn’t fear AI directly. Sure we will have to face uncertainty as job markets change and seek different skills. And that can be incredibly frustrating and challenging. But if you are a skilled professional you absolutely have the insights and talents necessary to thrive in a new world filled with AI. The ability to discern visual quality is still essential. The ability to organize and guide an effort to success is still relevant. “Production sense”, “vision”, an “artist’s eye”, and “creativity” all have as much value as they ever did.

Creative tools have changed and enabled the most unskilled an astounding degree of capability to produce impressive creative works. But that’s good, and doesn’t change the fact that those of us who have spent entire careers focusing on creating such imagery have gained a myriad of skills needed more than ever in assessing and learning to fully exploit these astounding new technologies and tools.

The key to relevancy today as a technical artist or professional creative in general is to ride this wave at it’s cutting edge. Our role in times like this is to identify the new creative opportunities inherent in these changes. Explore new mediums. Guide the engineers towards enabling better quality content as opposed to releasing a societal spam storm of mediocre content. Identify the new bar of quality and use AI and new methods such as gaussian splatting, realtime engines, spatial computing, code and asset generation, image and video generation in new ways. Creative ways.

We aren’t facing a disaster for creatives. It’s just change, filled with disruption of plans to be sure, but also filled with opportunity to be the ones who create entire new media, new forms of artistic expression, and creative content better than anything we dreamed possible in our lifetimes.

Surf this wave of change. Have fun with it. The core of what makes us creatives – vision, insight, keen minds and practical experience – is not at all devalued. Our use cases have just been reset, the canvas wiped clean. Now is the time to make your masterpiece.

Glassworking and Kilnforming, Music, Photography

Creative Work, Glassmaking, Music, Photography / By

I was recently asked if my work was all computer graphics. No, not at all. I think it’s important for all artists to experiment with various media. I dabble in photography and writing music, for instance.

Here is an audio sample:  

Other World Jazz

 

And here are a few photography samples . . . 

And not long ago I spent a few years exclusively exploring fine art glassworking, specifically “kilnforming.” I continue to create glass to this day.

This isn’t glass blowing, which takes a fair amount of infrastructure, constant energy demands, and teams of people… kilnforming instead is a more individual approach to fine art glass where glass is heated in kilns and the artist uses a variety of techniques to shape the glass over time.

I have and regularly use a personal glassmaking studio in my home. It took a long time to build and wasn’t cheap, with two professional glass kilns and a host of tools and workspace. But there is something about having a physical studio space in which one can create things of beauty out of nothing which is magical, and it was worth all the effort, time away from the VFX world, and cost. I have yet to regret any choice I’ve made where I make personal growth as an artist my priority.

While I will never get famous as a glass artist, that’s also not the point… I find glassworking to be very rewarding and completely different from the other creative avenues I explore.

Glass is magic. It can cut you, burn you, shatter and explode. While working glass it moves and changes, grudgingly allowing you to shape it. And then there it is, static and frozen and… hopefully… beautiful.

So far I’ve made textures, gifts, signs, wall art, tableware, jewelry, vases and bowls, and rewarding odd shapes. I’ve also accrued a few scars and a very healthy respect for how dangerous something can be when it’s heated several thousand degrees. As an art form glassworking is completely different from any other artistic pursuit I’ve explored, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Ideas, traveling

3D Graphics / By

Pingo van der Brinkloev hit me up for a very rough discussion of the conceptual approach to building knitted patterns in CG and came up with a pretty cool workflow to get similar results in C4D. Cool, nice work!

Art is collaborative. It loops back and forth between artists, techniques grow and we present constant challenges to ourselves and each other. Nothing makes me happier than to see this kind of mutual exchange of ideas across different toolsets. We are artists first, inspiring one another – the borders of studios, tools, location, language or genre should never keep us from exchange of ideas. Thriving ideas lead to a thriving market as a whole, employed artists, and most importantly better art across the board. I really believe lifting each other up is the best route to success for the individual artist as well as the industry as a whole, so when I saw how Pingo built this I was as excited as I was when I saw Jonah Friedman make entwiner in ICE. How can you not get excited? This is cool stuff!

CG Supervisor for 3 Nike Spots

3D Graphics, Creative Work / By

Two of 3 spots. “Evolution” was a small team, 3 weeks, lighting and effects with Softimage and Arnold.

I love small but intense projects like this.

“Run” was primarily Maya/Vray with a touch of ICE. The studio (Royale) is only 6 years old but advancing fast, and it’s been a real pleasure working with them. For their first exploration of ICE, Royale invited in some familiar SI friends – Ciaran Moloney, Steven Caron, Leonard Kotch, Billy Morrison and yours truly doing a first gig start to finish as a CG sup (which with guys like this mostly involved saying “go for it.”)

Like the Psyop “Telstra” spot, this commercial essentially required us to create a system for knitting cloth from massive numbers of strands. Leonard Kotch wrote a system which performs many of the same tasks as the Psyop “Entwiner” tool, but he took a slightly different direction, it was fascinating to compare how the two diverged. The progressive animation required for these two shots resulted in a pretty flexible and broad system, which we are currently using for the last of the three spots, which will wrap in production soon.

strandlayoutb_s40_062613 NikeEvo_shoe_comp_v001 NIKE_evolution_shot40

Royale has been an enthusiastic and fun group to work with and it’s been great getting to show a studio as strong as they are in design some of the possibilities ICE can bring to jobs like this. Expect to see some version of Leonard’s “LKFabric” system gifted to the community before long – very cool Royale, thanks! (They also throw good parties, their 6’th birthday celebration was impressive and… unusual.)

 

 

Soylent Art, its made from people.

Life, Miscellaneous / By

Since at the moment I am heads-down in production and can’t share the art I’m working on, I thought I would take a second to share someone else’s art – in this case a favorite piece by the wonderful and whimsical dance troupe, Momix.

While I have been lucky enough to have seen Pilobolus, The Alvin Ailey Dance Company, Martha Graham, and even some rare offshoots like Iso and The Bobs, I have never seen Momix live. If you like good art and have an opportunity to do so yourself, don’t pass it up.

And while I’m mentioning performance artists of the kinesthetic sort, if you live on the west coast and haven’t spent an evening with the Flying Karamozov Brothers, good lord – what’s keeping you?

Scraps

2D Graphics / By

My harddrive barfed up these scraps. What to do with all this? Put ’em on the internet of course.