Alan Bovik

Alan Conrad Bovik (born June 25, 1958) is an American engineer, vision scientist, and educator. He is a professor at the University of Colorado Boulder where he holds the Provost’s Chair in Engineering. He is a faculty member in the Department of Electrical, Computer, and Energy Engineering (ECEE) and is Director of Colorado’s Laboratory for Image and Video Engineering (LIVE). Previously he was a professor at The University of Texas at Austin (UT-Austin), where he held the Cockrell Family Regents Endowed Chair in the Cockrell School of Engineering.

Bovik received a Primetime Emmy Award in 2015 for his development of perception-based video quality measurement tools that are now standards in television production. He also received a Technology and Engineering Emmy Award in 2021 for the “development of perceptual metrics for video encoding optimization.”

Work Al Bovik was educated at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign (PhD 1984). He has made numerous fundamental contributions to the fields of digital photography, digital television, digital image processing, digital video processing, digital cinema, and computational visual perception. He is particularly well known for his work on low-level vision, natural scene modeling, image quality, and video quality.

He has published more than 1000 technical articles, books, and patents in these areas. He is also the author/editor of The Handbook of Image and Video Processing (Academic Press, 2nd edition, 2005), with Zhou Wang of Modern Image Quality Assessment (Morgan and Claypool, 2006), and the author/editor of the companion books The Essential Guide to Image Processing and The Essential Guide to Video Processing (Academic Press, 2009). Overall, his work has been cited in the scientific and engineering literature more than 200,000 times according to Google Scholar. He is one of the most highly cited engineers in the world according to the Web of Science.

Bovik is an elected member of the United States National Academy of Engineering (NAE), an elected Foreign Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE), an elected Fellow of the U.S. National Academy of Inventors, and an elected foreign member of Academia Europaea (2023). He is also a Life Fellow of the IEEE, a Fellow of Optica and of the Society of Photo-Optical and Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE), an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society (HonFRPS) and an Honorary Member of the Society for Imaging Science and Technology (IS&T). He is a voting member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (Television Academy) and was named an inaugural member of its Science and Technology Peer Group. He was named a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign in 2008. Courseware for Signal, Image, Video and Audio Processing. This online courseware offers online curricula for digital image and video processing and digital signal processing. SIVA includes hundreds of signal, image and video processing demonstrations delivering live, interactive audio-visual experiences of signal and image processing algorithms.

Awards Bovik has received a number of major international awards. These include:

The John Fritz Medal from the Society for Mining, Metallurgy, and Exploration in February 2025 “for foundational contributions to the theoretical and engineering aspects of perceptual picture and video quality prediction, leading to systems that ensure optimized visual quality for hundreds of millions of viewers daily.” The Edison Medal from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) in May 2022 "for pioneering high-impact scientific and engineering contributions leading to the perceptually optimized global streaming and sharing of visual media.” A BaM (“Bammy”) Award from the International Trade Association for Broadcast and Media (IABM) in December 2022 “for perceptual picture quality algorithms and databases for streaming and social media." BaM Awards are given to “any product that is recognized by the judging panel is not just an innovative solution but is genuinely important to the market and sets the standard in its category.” A Technology and Engineering Emmy Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) in October 2021 for the “development of perceptual metrics for video encoding optimization.” The Progress Medal from the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) in November 2019 "in recognition of any invention, research, publication or other contribution which has resulted in an important advance in the scientific or technological development of photography or imaging in the widest sense." Bovik was also named an Honorary Fellow of RPS (HonFRPS). The IEEE Fourier Award in 2019 “For seminal contributions and high-impact innovations to the theory and application of perception-based image and video processing.” The Edwin H. Land Medal from The Optical Society of America in 2017 “For substantially shaping the direction and advancement of modern perceptual image quality theory, and for energetically engaging industry to transform his ideas into global practice.” A Primetime Emmy Award (Primetime Emmy Engineering Award) for Outstanding Achievement in Engineering Development from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (The Television Academy) in October 2015 for his work on video quality prediction technology. The Norbert Wiener Society Award from the IEEE Signal Processing Society in 2013, “For fundamental contributions to digital image processing theory, technology, leadership and education.”

In addition he has been recognized by the following honors:

1997: Leo L. Beranek Meritorious Service Award of the IEEE Signal Processing Society 2000: IEEE Third Millennium Medal 2005: Claude Shannon-Harry Nyquist Technical Achievement Award of the IEEE Signal Processing Society 2007: Carl Friedrich Gauss Education Award of the IEEE Signal Processing Society 2008: Distinguished Alumnus Award, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 2009: IEEE Signal Processing Society Best Paper Award 2009: The University of Texas at Austin Hocott Distinguished Centennial Engineering Research Award 2010: IS&T/SPIE Imaging Scientist of the Year 2012: SPIE Technology Achievement Award 2013: IEEE Signal Processing Magazine Best Paper Award 2013: IEEE Signal Processing Society Young Author Best Paper Award (co-author) 2013: IS&T Honorary Member Award 2016: IEEE Circuits and Systems for Video Technology Best Paper Award 2016: The University of Texas at Austin Joe J. King Professional Engineering Achievement Award 2017: Google Scholar Classic Paper in the area Signal Processing 2017: Google Scholar Classic Paper in the area Computer Vision & Pattern Recognition 2017: IEEE Signal Processing Letters Best Paper Award 2017: IEEE Signal Processing Society Sustained Impact Paper Award 2018: EURASIP Best Paper Award 2019: IEEE ICIP Pioneer Award, “For unparalleled leadership and contributions to the image processing community.” 2020: EURASIP Best Paper Award 2020: The University of Texas at Austin Career Research Excellence Award