What do disability compliance, “Men in Black” and choreography have in common? They all utilize computer graphics, a growing field showcased Tuesday at an open house for the 10th anniversary of the Advanced Computing Center for the Arts and Design at the Ohio State University.The ACCAD is part of an interdisciplinary graduate program for computer graphics and the arts at OSU. The program works with any area of technology that has applications in the arts, said director Wayne Carlson, and crosses into fields like medicine, architecture and education.Some projects include wheelchair simulation to check accessibility of a building, virtual dance performances and animation seen in feature films, Carlson said. Neal McDonald, a graduate student in the program, said his last project was a chemistry tutorial, which he worked on with several other students. The tutorial will be used for chemistry 101 students and presents the information in a more interesting format, he said.McDonald said he really became interested in computers with the wave of handheld games when he was 13.”It was the first time I realized that computers could do stuff,” McDonald said.Brandon Morse is a first-year student who plans to use computer to create short films.”My interest came with seeing it through film and TV,” Morse said. “My original intent was to go into film.”The program at OSU is one of about six in the country, Carlson said. Other universities in Ohio like Bowling Green State University or University of Cincinnati offer undergraduate programs, but they do not have the research mission we do, he said.Carlson said the center has three focal points: research, academe and outreach. Research topics include visual image making, ethics on the Web and telecommunications. The academic area is to offer courses to students and to connect with emerging technologies in the community, Carlson said.The field of computer graphics and animation was pioneered 25 years ago by Charles Csuri, professor emeritus at OSU. He first developed an interest through his career in art and began to work with image transformation.”I had no idea where I was going,” he said. “I was just interested in an idea.”That first idea has changed into a whole field that encompasses technology like video games, the Web and movies.”In my wildest dreams I never saw a personal computer, and the Internet was like something out of science fiction,” Csuri said.As the field of technology grows, so does the necessity for the field of computer graphics and the arts.”Demand for the program has grown significantly,” Carlson said, but enrollment remains steady due to limited space and resources.