Duan Gao (高端)

Computer Graphics Researcher

I am a computer graphics researcher. I received my Ph.D. in Computer Science from Tsinghua University in 2022, advised by Prof. Kun Xu, and my bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Nanjing University in 2017.

Previously, I was a Principal Engineer in the Top Minds Program at Huawei Cloud Media Innovation Lab, where I worked on generative 3D digital humans, diffusion-based material generation, AIGC-3D, and differentiable rendering. I am currently a 3D Generation Algorithm Engineer at X Square Robot.

Research interests

Appearance modeling, Physically based rendering, Neural rendering, Differentiable rendering, 3D generative modeling

Services & Awards

Academic Services

Reviewer for SIGGRAPH 2022/2025, SIGGRAPH Asia 2023/2025, Eurographics, Pacific Graphics, The Visual Computer, Journal of Computer-Aided Design & Computer Graphics

Selected Awards

2022, Huawei Top Minds Program
2022, Outstanding Graduate of Beijing
2022, Outstanding Doctoral Graduate at Tsinghua University
2021, Style3D Graduate Fellowship
2019, Star of Tomorrow Intern Award at Microsoft Research Asia

Publications

ControlFace: Few-Shot 3D Face Generation via a Controllable Diffusion Model Guided by Text and Images

Jinfu Wei, Zheng Zhang, Qinchuan Zhang, Ran Liao, and Duan Gao

IEEE International Conference on Multimedia & Expo (ICME), 2025

Author PDF Supplementary Video

DreamPBR: Text-driven Generation of High-resolution SVBRDF with Multi-modal Guidance

Linxuan Xin, Zheng Zhang, Zhiyi Pan, Jinfu Wei, Duan Gao, and Wei Gao

IEEE International Conference on Multimedia & Expo (ICME), 2025

ArXiv Author PDF Supplementary

UniFaceGAN: High-Quality 3D Face Editing with a Unified Latent Space

Jinfu Wei, Zheng Zhang, Ran Liao, and Duan Gao

IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP), 2025

Author PDF IEEE

Neural Global Illumination publication thumbnail

Neural Global Illumination: Interactive Indirect Illumination Prediction under Dynamic Area Lights

Duan Gao, Haoyuan Mu, and Kun Xu

IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (TVCG), 2022

Author PDF IEEE Supplementary Video BibTeX

Deferred Neural Lighting publication thumbnail

Deferred Neural Lighting: Free-viewpoint Relighting from Unstructured Photographs

Duan Gao, Guojun Chen, Yue Dong, Pieter Peers, Kun Xu, and Xin Tong

ACM Transactions on Graphics (Proceedings of SIGGRAPH Asia), 2020

PDF (Low Resolution) PDF (High Resolution) Supplementary Video Slides Code BibTeX

Deep Inverse Rendering publication thumbnail

Deep Inverse Rendering for High-resolution SVBRDF Estimation from an Arbitrary Number of Images

Duan Gao*, Xiao Li*, Yue Dong, Pieter Peers, Kun Xu, and Xin Tong (* Equal contribution)

ACM Transactions on Graphics (Proceedings of SIGGRAPH), 2019

PDF (Low Resolution) PDF (High Resolution) Supplementary Video Slides Code BibTeX

Thesis

Neural Rendering: Deep Learning Based Photorealistic Rendering

基于深度学习的真实感渲染研究

Ph.D. June 2022

Supervisor: Kun Xu

Paper PDF (Low Resolution)

A Learning-Based Rendering Algorithm for Translucent Materials

(基于学习的)高逼真半透明材质的渲染方法

Bachelor June 2017

Supervisor: Kun Xu, Jie Guo

Paper

Experience

2025-Present

3D Generation Algorithm Engineer

X Square Robot

3D generation algorithm engineering and system development for embodied robotics applications.
2022-2025

Principal Engineer, Top Minds (天才少年)

Huawei Cloud, Media Innovation Lab

Worked on generative 3D digital humans, diffusion-based material generation, AIGC-3D, and differentiable rendering.
2019.10-2020.5

Research Intern

Microsoft Research Asia, Internet Graphics Group

Conducted research on neural relighting with Dr. Guojun Chen, Dr. Yue Dong, and Dr. Xin Tong.
2019.7-2019.8

Research Intern

Tencent AI Lab

Conducted research on 3D face reconstruction with Dr. Haozhi Huang.
2018.8-2019.5

Research Intern

Microsoft Research Asia, Internet Graphics Group

Conducted research on appearance modeling with Dr. Yue Dong and Dr. Xin Tong.
2017.7-2017.9

Research Intern

Megvii (Face++)

Conducted research on facial recovery and rendering with Dr. Liqian Ma.