Each proposal is extensively reviewed by peers from the SIGGRAPH community. Reviews are chosen for their familiarity with the content of the proposal. In their reviews, jurors consider factors such as:

1. Relevance: Does the workshop cover both the topics of SIGGRAPH and Symposium on Apps.
2. Concept: How exceptional are the ideas, problems, solutions, aesthetics, etc. presented in this submission? How coherently does the submission convey its overall concept? Is the concept similar to existing ones, or does it stand out as unique and original?
3. Novelty: How new and fresh is this work? Is it a new, ground-breaking approach to an old problem, or is it an existing approach with a slightly new twist? Second, you should evaluate you work in the context of other approaches where appropriate: Is it faster? Easier to use? Does it give better results? Is it more accurate?
4. Interest: Will conference attendees want to see this material? Will it inspire them? Are the results or approaches appealing to a broad audience? This is partly a measure of how broad the potential audience is and partly a measure of the overall clarity and novelty of the submission. A submission in a very niche area is more likely to be accepted if the results are exceptionally better than what exists already, or if the proposed solution might be applicable to other areas.
5. Quality, Craft, and Completeness: This is a measure of how well-written the proposal is and the quality of the supporting materials. The proposal must effectively communicate their proposal in enough detail and clarity so that the jury can evaluate it.
6. Speaker Expertise and Ability to Cover the Topic: Ability to communicate ideas and to teach, as well as language skills, will be reviewed. So it is really important that you explain how you are going to convey your points: What is the tone of your event? What kind of learning material and techniques will you use to support you presentation?

The final submission score is based on a combination of these factors. For example, a submission that is high quality, has broad appeal, and contains something new is likely to be accepted, while a submission that is incremental, of interest to only a small number of people, and poorly written will probably be rejected.

Event organizers should learn the results of the review process by mid-October 2011.

Closer to the event the organizer will confirm the schedule, and any presentation, workshop or exhibit needs. Contributor of Presentations, Panels, or Workshops will be required to submit publication-ready materials about one month prior to the event.

Creating good presentation materials is a time-consuming task that can provide much more materials than presented in person. See this example of good Course Notes provided by the Courses program of SIGGRAPH Asia 2011. Presenters should take this time commitment into account as they plan their schedule for the months before the conference.

Deadlines and Extensions

What is the submission deadline?
The workshop proposal submission deadline is 15 September, 23:59 UTC/GMT. This is 7:59 pm, 15 September in New York; 4:59 pm, 15 September in Los Angeles; and 7:59 am, 16 September in Hong Kong. Double-check the submission date and time for your region basing yourself on 15 June, 23:59 UTC/GMT deadline.

Can I submit after the deadline?
No. The deadline is absolute. All submissions receive equal consideration up to the published deadline. Please respect other contributors and allow time for unforeseen circumstances in your submission, including (but not limited to) network connectivity, equipment failures, job impacts, life or family events, etc. These personal circumstances are outside of SIGGRAPH Asia 2011's direct control and cannot be accommodated fairly.

Why is this so absolute?
Primarily, the answer is fairness and equal opportunity for consideration. This respects the contribution process for all submissions. Secondly, the deadlines were designed to maximize submission development and quality for all contributors, including those contributing to other SIGGRAPH Asia 2011 programs. Submission deadlines are set as late as possible, but they must also support quality in review, production, and delivery at SIGGRAPH Asia 2011.

Are partial or incomplete submissions considered?
Incomplete submissions are not guaranteed a review. Contributors are required to minimally meet all submission requirements by the published deadline. The Committee will evaluate the merit of each completed proposal as it was submitted at the deadline even if it does not meet the author's personal quality objectives. Please allow yourself enough time to meet your own quality goals.

How will SIGGRAPH Asia 2011 address network failures?
SIGGRAPH Asia 2011 is only responsible for the availability of the submission server. If the Symposium on Apps Chair is notified of a hardware or service failure in the submission system, the Symposium on Apps Chair will authorize an appropriate adjustment (and will prominently post notices at several locations). All other network failures between your location and the SIGGRAPH server will not affect the submission deadline. Please submit early to avoid connectivity-support problems or last-minute submission-server performance issues.

The SIGGRAPH Asia 2011 English Review Service failed our schedule, so it is SIGGRAPH Asia 2011's fault that our proposal is late. Can we have an extension?
No. The English Review Service is a volunteer organization, and is administered separately from the SIGGRAPH Asia 2011 Symposium on Apps program. Although they will do their best to help, they can make no guarantee of performance or service turn-around. While the deadline for submitting your proposal for review by the English Review Service is two weeks before the Symposium on Apps deadline, we recommend that you submit your work as early as possible.

Submissions

Why is it necessary to specify an intended audience? The average SIGGRAPH conference attendee should be sufficient detail, no?
No. The attendee population is actually very diverse. It includes different experience levels, different backgrounds, and different interests in technical and artistic topics. Your detailed audience identification aids proposal evaluation by the reviewers (to ensure that your material is appropriate to the audience you wish to reach), by the Symposium on Apps Committee (for program balancing), and for proper marketing to interested conference attendees.

Does SIGGRAPH Asia 2011 tend to favor or avoid specific levels of material (beginner, intermediate, advanced)?
While we do specify introductory-level events in our general themes, we do not favor or avoid specific levels of material. SIGGRAPH Asia 2011 will serve a wide international audience of many capabilities. The richest, most engaging materials are desired no matter what their level. This is your opportunity to address a community need with your expertise. The Symposium on Apps Committee will offer the best-balanced program possible with available submissions and resources. This includes the need for a good mixture of beginning, intermediate, and advanced presentations.

We have a great idea for an untried topic. Should we submit it?
Absolutely! While this is the first iteration of Symposium on Apps and most topics are novel, we seek innovation both in topics and presentation. New ideas that relate to some aspect of computer graphics in mobile computing and interactive techniques are most welcome for consideration. You should clearly state this relevance in the rationale of your proposal.

Do you support anything other than Portable Document Format (PDF)? It is easier for me to provide files in (your file type here). Everyone can read those, right?
No, please submit in PDF format. Reviewers come from many backgrounds and use many operating systems (Windows, Mac OS, Linux, etc.). PDF provides easy standardization (universal viewer support, graphics, embedded fonts, etc.) for both the reviewer and the proposer (for example, it preserves intentional formatting by the submitter). Even ASCII clear text is not "universal" due to carriage-return differences, column widths, lack of graphics, etc. While we are unable to provide document conversion software that generates PDF output, please note that many websites provide such services. Keying in the following keywords: "online word to pdf converter" in any major search engine's search box will give you a list of such services.

What are good-quality presentation/workshop notes?
Think of your notes as being the textbook chapters that you summarize in your presentation. Good-quality notes are any combination of materials (text, images, video, source code, demos, etc.) that can assist people during your presentation and beyond the scope of the auditorium. Copies of the slides, images, and videos used during the presentation are common, but by themselves are not enough. They should be annotated with additional detailed explanations of complex concepts, elaborations on related topics that could not be fit into the time of the presentation, mathematical derivations, etc.

Clear examples, tutorials, explanation of techniques, annotations from your experience, and program source code, for example, are always appreciated by the attendees. This material should help attendees accurately understand your presentation and build a useful context for application of what they have learned.

Please refer to the Courses' sample Course Notes that help gauge what would be a quality set of notes for your Workshop Notes.

Our presentation/workshop notes are completely done. Should we put them all in the download area as part of our submission?
No. A representative sampling of the quality of your notes is all that is required. Complete sets can overwhelm and complicate the review process. It is better to show a subsection that demonstrates detail, annotation, and supplemental materials than provide the entire set.

In addition to the Presentation / Workshop Notes sample PDF, can I submit additional materials (audio, video, animations, etc.) with my submission?
While we only accept a sample PDF of the notes to be submitted with your proposal, you are encouraged to include a list of additional materials with your proposal. If you have samples of materials available for consideration with your proposal, please provide a reference (for example, a URL) to their location.

Upon Acceptance

Our proposal was accepted. Now it is time to submit our Presentation / Workshop Notes. Unfortunately, we have not had time to complete everything to the level of examples that we submitted during the review process. This will be okay, right?
No. We may have a serious problem. If the final materials fail to meet or exceed the quality of the accepted proposal, the Symposium on Apps Chair may decide to cancel your event.

I'm an event organizer who has one or more lecturers/presenters who have not completed their notes. Your publication deadline is fast approaching. Can we have an extension?
No. Unfortunately, all deadlines (proposal, Workshop Notes, etc.) are closely tied to publication and production. They cannot be extended. In absolute worst-case scenarios, the Symposium on Apps Chair may decide to cancel your session.