Disney Research Fellow Lanny Smoot to Headline SIGGRAPH 2026 with Special Keynote

The only other Disney personality to be inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame along with Walt Disney himself, Lanny Smoot, is set to take center stage at SIGGRAPH 2026.

What's Happening:

• SIGGRAPH 2026, the world's premier conference on computer graphics and interactive techniques is set to take place July 19-23 in Los Angeles, bringing together a global community of researchers, artists, developers, and engineers to explore the latest advances shaping the future of computer graphics and interactive techniques.
• This year's conference features a landmark keynote from Lanny Smoot, research fellow at Disney Research and one of The Walt Disney Company's most prolific inventors.
• Smoot’s keynote, “Inventions, Innovations, and Imagination: Lanny Smoot’s Prolific Path,” will take audiences on a firsthand journey through a career built at the intersection of engineering, art, and storytelling, offering insight into how bold technical ideas become real-world experiences that audiences around the globe encounter every day.
• As the holder of 107 patents and a 2024 inductee into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, Smoot is only the second person from The Walt Disney Company to receive that distinction, following Walt Disney himself.
• For more than 45 years, his work has advanced fiber optics, video-on-demand, immersive media, themed entertainment, and extended reality. His inventions are woven into Disney theme parks, resorts, and cruise ships worldwide and have made appearances in SIGGRAPH’s Emerging Technologies program, where they have become enduring reference points in the field.
• In his keynote, Smoot will illustrate how invention functions best as a team sport, with breakthroughs emerging when engineers, artists, and storytellers bring complementary strengths to shared problems. He credits cross-disciplinary collaboration as the defining factor in his most significant work, noting that knowing enough about a teammate’s field to communicate a problem in their language is the foundation for turning ambitious ideas into finished experiences.
• Smoot’s keynote reflects the SIGGRAPH 2026 program’s mission to advance the state of the art in computer graphics and interactive techniques, connect research with production, and inspire future breakthroughs across a global community of researchers, artists, developers, and engineers.

What They're Saying:

• SIGGRAPH 2026 Conference Chair Chris Redmann: “Having Lanny Smoot as our keynote speaker sets the tone for everything we are building at SIGGRAPH 2026. His journey from groundbreaking R&D at Bell Labs to bringing creative ideas to life at Walt Disney Imagineering and Disney Research is exactly the kind of leadership our community looks to for inspiration. Lanny's belief that invention is a team sport aligns directly with our mission to advance cross-disciplinary collaboration across research, art, and engineering. For every researcher, artist, and engineer in that room, his story is proof of what becomes possible when bold ideas meet the right team.”
• Lanny Smoot: “Each time that I have made a contribution to SIGGRAPH, I have taken home more than I have given. I believe that successful technical practitioners love to create and want to learn from others who have new ideas that might fill the gaps in the dreams that they have. There is one other strong motivation, and it is the desire to show off a latest brainchild, but with a gentle human competitive spirit that ends with camaraderie...For the younger folks in the audience, I would like them to know that they can have great joy in being an inventor. We don’t have to be experts in all technical (or artistic) areas, as it is teams of people with different strengths who are most likely to do amazing work. For the experienced technical practitioner: Enjoy the friendly competition to create new technologies ... we technologists are a very important part of society, and we are often in the lead in how the world can be made a better place.”

About Lanny Smoot:

• Lanny Smoot is one of the most influential engineers working in themed entertainment today. He’s an electrical engineer, inventor, and longtime Disney Imagineer known for blending advanced technology with practical stage magic and immersive storytelling.
• Currently working for The Walt Disney Company, Smoot works as a Research Fellow - the company's highest technical honor.
• Among those 100+ patents, some of his best known inventions and contributions include:
  • The realistic retractable Star Wars lightsaber developed for Disney Parks and the former Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser
  • Effects for the Haunted Mansion, including the tech for the floating Madame Leota illusion.
  • The Holotile floor, an omni-directional moving floor system designed for VR and immersive environments.
• Before Disney, Smoot spent decades at Bell Labs working on early video conferencing, fiber-optic systems, and streaming-related technologies. One of his inventions, the “VideoWindow,” became part of the Smithsonian’s Information Age exhibit.
• A big part of Smoot’s reputation is that he combines hardcore engineering with theatrical illusion. Other Imagineers often describe him as someone who can make science feel magical. He’s also become an important STEM role model for an upcoming generation.