About DM

What I Do

• I worked for Canon Information Systems Research Australia on digital imaging and image processing projects.
• I chair the Australian delegation to the International Standards Organisation (ISO) Technical Committee 42: Photography.
• I am on the organising committee for the Digital Photography conference at the IS&T Electronic Imaging symposium, held annually in San Francisco.
• I volunteer in CSIRO's Scientists in Schools program, visiting schools and talking to children (kindergarten to year 6) about science.
• I volunteer as a teacher for Primary Ethics, teaching ethics classes for primary school children as an alternative to religious education, as part of the NSW schools curriculum.
• I write and publish various webcomics (list on my home page).
• I organise the mezzacotta Puzzle Competition.

My LinkedIn profile.

What I Did

• I studied astrophysics at the University of Sydney. My Ph.D. project was a study of absorption lines in high-redshift quasar spectra, using high-resolution spectroscopy observations made at the 3.9 metre Anglo-Australian Telescope at Siding Springs, near Coonabarabran, New South Wales.
• I taught experimental physics in the university undergraduate laboratories for seven years.
• I gave lectures on stellar evolution and cosmology as part of an adult education course in modern physics for three years.
• For two years I was the Webmaster and Australian National Representative for CricInfo, helping to build it from an amateur site to the most popular single-sport web site in the world.
• I worked at the Australia Telescope National Facility designing and implementing a WWW preprint server, in cooperation with the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, USA.
• Then I worked with Agentis International, designing and implementing user interfaces and communication protocols to a back end artificial intelligence system.
• Then I worked with IBM Global Services Australia, doing web site coding and back end integration for e-business clients.
• Then I taught high school science.
• Then I worked as an educational consultant for the Australian Institute of Mathematics.
• I have written books and other material for the GURPS role-playing game line, as well as articles for Pyramid magazine.
• I organised the CiSRA Puzzle Competition from 2007 to 2013.

If you've found this page looking for the Xvoigt astronomical absorption line fitting program I wrote: It is badly out of date and there are better programs available these days. Try vpguess.

Publications

Academic

My author profile at Google Scholar.

1. Pettini, M.; Hunstead, R. W.; Smith, L. J.; and Mar, D. P., 1990, Mon. Not. R. astr. Soc., 246, 545-564. "The Lyman alpha forest at 6 km/s resolution."
2. Mar, D., 1991, Proc. A. S. A., 9, (1), 195. Book review, "At the Edge of the Universe by Alan Wright and Hilary Wright."
3. Manchester, R. N.; Mar, D. P.; Lyne, A.; Kaspi, V.; and Johnston, S., 1993, Astrophys. J. (Letters), 403, L29-L31. "Radio detection of PSR B0540-69."
4. Hunstead, R. W.; Mar, D. P.; and Pettini, M., 1995, J. Astrophys. Astr., 16 Suppl., 103. "The Lyman alpha absorbers - probes of the high redshift universe."
5. Mar, D. P., and Bailey, G., 1995, P. A. S. A., 12, (2), 239. "Xvoigt - An interactive absorption line fitting program for the X Window System."
6. Mar, D. P., 1995, Ph. D. thesis, University of Sydney. "High Resolution Studies of the Lyman α Forest."
7. Storey, Michelle C.; Morgan-Mar, David; Nicholls, Jennifer; Norris, Ray P., 1997, Electronic Publishing, Now and the Future, 23rd meeting of the IAU, Joint Discussion 12, 25 August 1997, Kyoto, Japan, "Electronic Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia."
8. Larkin, K.; Morgan-Mar, D.; Deller, C., 2007, Australian Physics, 44, (2), 57-59. "Physics at CiSRA."
9. Morgan-Mar, David P.; Arnison, Matthew R.; Deller, Chris A.; Fletcher, Peter A.; Larkin, Kieran G., 2011, "Two-dimensional measurement of the lens optical transfer function from a digital image", Proceedings of SPIE Volume: 7876, 16.
10. Arnison, Matthew R.; Morgan-Mar, David P.; Deller, Chris A.; Fletcher, Peter A.; and Larkin, Kieran G., 2011, "Measurement of the lens optical transfer function using a tartan pattern," Appl. Opt. 50, 2158-2169.
11. Morgan-Mar, David P.; Arnison, Matthew R., 2013, "Focus finding using scale invariant patterns", Proceedings of SPIE Volume: 8660.
12. Morgan-Mar, David P.; Arnison, Matthew R., 2014, "Depth from defocus using the mean spectral ratio", Proceedings of SPIE Volume: 9023.
13. Morgan-Mar, David P.; Arnison, Matthew R., 2018, "Adaptive spectral masking for depth from defocus", presentation-only paper at Photography, Mobile, and Immersive Imaging XIV, Electronic Imaging 2018, Burlingame.

Patents

1. Deller, Christine Anne; Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew R., Australian Patent Application 2007254622, "Systems for optical transfer function measurement with perspective alignment", filed 2007-12-21.
2. Deller, Christine Anne; Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Larkin, Kieran Gerard; Arnison, Matthew R.; Hardy, Stephen James, Australian Patent 2007254627, "Geometric parameter measurement of an imaging device", filed 2007-12-21, granted 2010-10-21: AU2007254627.
3. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew R., Australian Patent Application 2008229672, "Image quality test chart calibration", filed 2008-09-26.
4. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Hardy, Stephen James; Arnison, Matthew R.; Larkin, Kieran Gerard; Deller, Christine Anne, United States Patent 8818130 (Application 20090161945), "Geometric parameter measurement of an imaging device", filed 2008-11-21, granted 2014-08-26. (AU2007254627)
5. Deller, Christine Anne; Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew R., Australian Patent Application 2008249442, "Chart linearity measurement in variable lighting", filed 2008-11-27.
6. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Larkin, Kieren Gerard, Australian Patent Application 2009251020, "Method of encoding data", filed 2009-12-17.
7. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Pham, Tuan Quang; Arnison, Matthew R.; Larkin, Kieran Gerard, Australian Patent 2011224051, "Determining a depth map from images of a scene", filed 2011-09-14, granted 2014-08-10: AU2011224051.
8. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Larkin, Kieran Gerard; Arnison, Matthew R.; Fletcher, Peter Alleine., Australian Patent Application 2012201969, "Determining a depth map from images of a scene", filed 2012-04-04.
9. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Pham, Tuan Quang; Arnison, Matthew R.; Larkin, Kieran Gerard, United States Patent 9836855, "Determining a depth map from images of a scene", filed 2012-09-07, granted 2017-12-05. (AU2011224051)
10. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Larkin, Kieran Gerard; Arnison, Matthew R., Australian Patent Application 2012258467, "Bokeh amplification", filed 2012-12-03.
11. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Larkin, Kieran Gerard; Arnison, Matthew R.; Fletcher, Peter Alleine.; Pham, Tuan Quang, United States Patent 9117277, "Determining a depth map from images of a scene", filed 2013-04-02, granted 2015-08-25. (AU2012201969)
12. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Pham, Tuan Quang; Arnison, Matthew R.; Larkin, Kieran Gerard, Japanese Patent 5362087, "Method for determining distance information, method for determining distance map, computer device, imaging system, and computer program", filed 2013-04-04 (JP2013062803), granted 2013-12-11. (AU2011224051, US9836855)
13. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew Raphael, Australian Patent Application 2013273843, "Motion blur compensation for depth from defocus", filed 2013-12-23.
14. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Larkin, Kieran Gerard; Arnison, Matthew R., United States Patent 8989517, "Bokeh amplification", filed 2013-11-13, granted 2015-03-24. (AU2012258467)
15. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew Raphael, United States Patent 9639948, "Motion blur compensation for depth from defocus", filed 2014-12-22, granted 2017-05-02. (AU2013273843)
16. Arnison, Matthew R.; Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Pakulski, Peter Jan, Australian Patent Application 2015202282, "Camera parameter optimisation for depth from defocus", filed 2015-05-01.
17. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew R., Australian Patent Application 2015202286, "Method, system and apparatus for determining distance to an object in a scene", filed 2015-05-01.
18. Kowald, Julie Rae; Wong, Anna; Dorrell, Andrew James; Morgan-Mar, David Peter, Australian Patent Application 2015258346, "Method and system of transitioning between images", filed 2015-11-23.
19. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew R., United States Patent 10026183, "Method, system and apparatus for determining distance to an object in a scene", filed 2016-04-29, granted 2018-07-17. (AU2015202286)
20. Fletcher, Peter Alleine; Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew Raphael; Mason, Timothy Stephen, Australian Patent Application 2017225023, "System and method for determining a camera pose", filed 2017-09-05.
21. Fletcher, Peter Alleine; Karlov, David; Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Mason, Timothy Stephen, Australian Patent Application 2018203328, "System and method for aligning views of a graphical object", filed 2018-05-11.
22. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Karlov, David; Arnison, Matthew Raphael; Fletcher, Peter Alleine; Mason, Timothy Stephen, Australian Patent Application 2018203329, "System and method for determining reflectance properties", filed 2018-05-11.
23. Arnison, Matthew Raphael; Karlov, David; Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Fletcher, Peter Alleine; Huynh-Thu, Thai Quan; Mason, Timothy Stephen, Australian Patent Application 2019201822, "BRDF scanning using an imaging capture system", filed 2019-03-15.
24. Morgan-Mar, David Peter; Arnison, Matthew Raphael; Fletcher, Peter Alleine; Mason, Timothy Stephen, Australian Patent Application 2019201825, "Multi-scale alignment pattern", filed 2019-03-15.

Non-Academic

My author profile at Goodreads.

1. Morgan-Mar, D., 1999, Pyramid, 2 April, 1999. "Spice up Your RoboRally."
2. Morgan-Mar, D., 1999, Pyramid, 24 September, 1999. "There's No Place Like Home."
3. Jackson, Steve; and Barton, William A., GURPS Space, 3rd Edition, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 1999, ISBN 1-55634-390-6. Playtester.
4. Hite, K.; Neumeier, C.; and Schiffer, M. S., GURPS Alternate Earths 2, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 1999, ISBN 1-55634-399-X. Playtester.
5. Ford, John M.; and Maliszewski, J., GURPS Traveller: Starports, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2000, ISBN 1-55634-401-5. Playtester.
6. Lowder, James, GURPS Villains, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2000, ISBN 1-55634-414-7. Playtester.
7. Stoddard, William H., GURPS Steampunk, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2000, ISBN 1-55634-419-8. Additional material author.
8. Morgan-Mar, D., 2000, Pyramid, 8 December, 2000. "Floating on Air."
9. O'Sullivan, Steffan, GURPS Bestiary, 3rd Edition, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2000, ISBN 1-55634-412-0. Contributing author.
10. Stoddard, William H., GURPS Low-Tech, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2001, ISBN 1-55634-343-4. Additional material author.
11. Pratchett, Terry; and Masters, Phil, GURPS Discworld Also, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2001, ISBN 1-55634-447-3. Playtester.
12. Masters, Phil, GURPS Atlantis, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2001, ISBN 1-55634-478-3. Playtester.
13. Kenson, Stephen, GURPS Spirits, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2001, ISBN 1-55634-516-X. Playtester.
14. Johnson, Hunter, GURPS Monsters, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2001, ISBN 1-55634-518-6. Contributing author.
15. Johnson, Hunter, 2001, Pyramid, 23 December, 2001. "GURPS Monsters Designers Notes."
16. Stoddard, William H., GURPS Steam-Tech, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2001, ISBN 1-55634-563-1. Contributing author.
17. Morgan-Mar, D., 2002, Pyramid, 11 January, 2002. "The World in a Bottle."
18. Morgan-Mar, D., 2002, Pyramid, 22 March, 2002. "Appendix Z: Not So Plain Sailing."
19. Morgan-Mar, D., 2002, Pyramid, 12 April, 2002. "Sports in Role-Playing Games."
20. Morgan-Mar, D., 2002, Pyramid, 26 April, 2002. "Appendix Z: Starship Troubles."
21. Underhill, Brian J., GURPS Cliffhangers, 2nd Edition, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2002, ISBN 1-55634-589-5. Additional material author.
22. Cambias, James L., GURPS Mars, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2002, ISBN 1-55634-534-8. Playtester.
23. Morgan-Mar, D., 2002, Pyramid, 22 November, 2002. "Transtoony Space."
24. Morgan-Mar, D., 2003, Pyramid, 10 January, 2003. "Fantasy Astrology: When The Stars Are Right."
25. Pulver, David, Transhuman Space: Deep Beyond, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2003, ISBN 1-55634-586-0. Playtester.
26. Morgan-Mar, D., 2003, Pyramid, 25 April, 2003. "Appendix Z: Information Overload!"
27. Stoddard, William H.; and Zeigler, Jon F., GURPS Blue Planet, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2003, ISBN 1-55634-588-7. Additional material author.
28. Morgan-Mar, David; Peters, Kenneth; and Thomas, Constantine, 2003, Pyramid, 5 September, 2003. "Designers' Notes: Transhuman Space: Under Pressure."
29. Morgan-Mar, D., 2003, Pyramid, 12 September, 2003. "Fantasy Cosmology: When The Stars Are Just Lights."
30. Morgan-Mar, David; Peters, Kenneth; and Thomas, Constantine, Transhuman Space: Under Pressure, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2003, ISBN 1-55634-678-6.
31. Morgan-Mar, D., 2003, Pyramid, 10 October, 2003. "First Contact: We Are Not Alone."
32. Morgan-Mar, D., 2003, Pyramid, 7 November, 2003. "Australian Aboriginal Magic."
33. Morgan-Mar, D., 2004, Pyramid, 27 February, 2004. "Losing the Memories of Civilization."
34. Morgan-Mar, D., 2004, Pyramid, 2 April, 2004. "Campaign in a Box: Situation Conspiracy."
35. Morgan-Mar, D., 2004, Pyramid, 21 May, 2004. "The Last Stone Age Adventure: The Hidden Valley of the Kulku."
36. Morgan-Mar, D., 2004, Pyramid, 6 August, 2004. "Iron Ref: Cliffhangers -- The Musical Clue."
37. Morgan-Mar, D, GURPS Update, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2004.
38. Morgan-Mar, D., 2004, Pyramid, 20 August, 2004. "GURPS Fourth Edition Preview: Updating Katrina."
39. Morgan-Mar, D., 2004, Pyramid, 27 August, 2004. "The Seven Deadly Magics."
40. Morgan-Mar, D., Singapore Sling, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2005.
41. Jackson, Steve, Munchkin Fu 2: Monky Business, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2005, ISBN 1-55634-739-1. Title name.
42. Morgan-Mar, D., GURPS Casey & Andy, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2005.
43. Morgan-Mar, D., 2005, Pyramid, 15 July, 2005. "Creatures of the Night: The Idden."
44. Zeigler, Jon; and Cambias, James, GURPS Space, 4th Edition, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2006, ISBN 1-55634-245-4. Playtester.
45. Doc Cross, TOON Munchkin, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2006. Playtester.
46. Morgan-Mar, D.; and Pulver, D., 2006, Pyramid, 22 September, 2006. "Designers' Notes: GURPS Bio-Tech."
47. Morgan-Mar, D., 2006, Pyramid, 22 September, 2006. "The Omniscient Eye: Why Is The Sky Green (On Caphelon IV)?"
48. Morgan-Mar, David; and Pulver, David, GURPS Bio-Tech, 2nd Edition, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2006, ISBN 1-55634-752-9.
49. Booth, John, Collect All 21! Memoirs of a Star Wars Geek - The First 30 Years, 2nd Edition, Lulu.com, 2009. ISBN 978-1-4357-4376-2. Foreword.
50. Stoddard, William H., GURPS Low-Tech, Second Edition, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2010, ISBN 1-55634-802-0. Additional material author.
51. Stoddard, William H., GURPS Social Engineering: Back to School, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2015, PDF e-book. Additional material author.
52. Stoddard, William H., GURPS Powers: The Weird, Steve Jackson Games, Austin, 2016, PDF e-book. Additional material author.
53. Morgan-Mar, David, Irregular Webcomic! Burning Down the Alehouse, 2016, ISBN 978-1-936561-40-7.
54. Morgan-Mar, David, Irregular Webcomic! Prepare for the Wurst, 2018, ISBN 978-1-936561-51-3.

Awards and Nominations

• Olympic Cup, 1988. Awarded to "The People of Australia".
• Time Person of the Year, 2006.
• Nominee: 2007 Origins Award for Best Role-Playing Game Supplement: GURPS Bio-Tech, author.
• Winner: 2010 Emmy Award for Outstanding Creative Achievement in Interactive Media - Fiction: Star Wars: Uncut, actor.

I acted in the part of Han Solo for a segment* of the Star Wars: Uncut project, which won the 2010 Emmy Award for Outstanding Creative Achievement in Interactive Media - Fiction.

* Scene 307: The Death Star detention block corridor just before jumping into the garbage chute. My line was, "Get in there!" (We also filmed Scene 237, where I got to say, "Ancient weapons and hokey religions are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid.")

Erdős-Bacon Number: 6

Erdős Number: 4

• David Morgan-Mar and Geoff Bailey, "Xvoigt - An interactive absorption line fitting program for the X Window System," Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia 12 (2), 1995.
• Geoff Bailey and Elias Dahlhaus, "Recognition of path graphs in linear time," Theoretical Computer Science (Ravello, 1995), 201-210, World Sci. Publ., River Edge, NJ, 1996.
• Elias Dahlhaus and Wayne D. Goddard, "MAD trees and distance-hereditary graphs," Discrete Applied Mathematics 131 (2003), no. 1, 151-167.
• Wayne D. Goddard and Paul Erdős, "Crossing families," Combinatorica 14 (1994), no. 2, 127-134.

Bacon Number: 2

• David Morgan-Mar was in The People vs. George Lucas (2010) with Karen Allen.
• Karen Allen was in Animal House (1989) with Kevin Bacon.

Sabbath Number: 5

• David Morgan-Mar wrote some of the lyrics for Line and Length by The Duckworth Lewis Method, featuring Neil Hannon.**
• Neil Hannon and Nick Seymour were in The Cake Sale.
• Nick Seymour and Mark Hart were in Crowded House.
• Mark Hart and Keith Baker were in Supertramp.
• Keith Baker and Bob Daisley were in Uriah Heep.
• (Bob Daisley was a member of Black Sabbath.)

** The song Line and Length contains the lyrics:

The line of a delivery is the direction of its trajectory measured in the horizontal axis.
The length of a delivery is how far down the pitch towards the batsman the ball bounces.

My listed Erdős-Bacon-Sabbath Number is 16, but I've reduced its Sabbath Number by 2, so it should be 14.