Special BMC80 podcast–coming in June!

THE MEDICAL ILLUSTRATION PODCAST PRESENTS: TORONTO BMC PROGRAM 80TH ANNIVERSARY

Topics: Education | Industry Training | Graduate Program History

The Master of Science in Biomedical Communications at the University of Toronto continuously evolves to meet the ever-changing needs of science communication. In this special episode of the Medical Illustration Podcast, host Paul Kelly sits down with Director and Associate Professor Michael Corrin and Associate Director and Associate Professor Shelley Wall for an in-depth conversation on the program’s rich history, key milestones, and lasting impact. They share insights into their roles in shaping BMC through academic leadership, curriculum development, student mentorship, and research oversight. Don’t miss this fascinating look at how BMC has grown into a powerhouse in visual science communication!

Release Date: June 2025

Paul Kelly is a professional certified medical illustrator working in Toronto, Canada, at TVASurg (Toronto Video Atlas of Surgery). He specializes in 3D animation and video editing for teaching surgery. The Medical Illustration Podcast is an audio resource for those interested in the field of medical illustration, featuring interviews with seasoned professionals, and industry updates.

Return to BMC80 main page.

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Web sites referenced:

Medical Illustration Podcast: https://soundcloud.com/medillustrationpodcast

Paul Kelly’s LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-f-kelly-3989831b/?originalSubdomain=ca

Michael Corrin’s Faculty Profile https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/faculty-staff/#corrin

Shelley Wall’s Faculty Profile https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/faculty-staff/#wall

TVASurg web site https://pie.med.utoronto.ca/TVASurg/

BMC80 main page: https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/bmc80

BMC Alumni Association Gala: celebrate 80 years in May!


Join fellow alumni and students Saturday, May 31 for the Biomedical Communications Alumni Association (BMCAA) Gala—a special event to reconnect, reminisce, and raise a toast to 80 years of biomedical visualization at the University of Toronto.

Don’t miss this chance to celebrate our shared history and the future of BMC!

More details coming soon…

Return to BMC80 main page.

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Web sites referenced

Biomedical Communications Alumni Association (BMCAA) https://www.bmcaa.com

BMC80 main page https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/bmc80

BMC80 Anatomical illustration challenge–now until May 30

Illustration Credits: Shehryar (Shay) Saharan (Arteries of the Face & Scalp), Dave Mazierski (Camel Anatomy, Superficial Nerves and Blood Vessels), and Maria Torrence Wishart (Knee Surgery)

The Anatomical Illustration Challenge is a community-driven event celebrating 80 years of BMC! This is your chance to showcase your anatomical illustration skills while honouring the rich history and exciting future of BMC as a leader in medical illustration.

Create a new, original illustration, information graphic, animation, comic or any other media type that features human or animal anatomy. Let your creativity shine!

Deadline: May 30, 2025 (Aligned with the AMI Salon Deadline 👀)

  • Create a new, original illustration, information graphic, animation, or any other visual media that features human or animal anatomy. This could include anything from anatomical cross-sections, microscopic processes and surgical scenes, to comparative anatomy studies. Let your creativity shine!

    Maybe you're:

    • Looking for motivation to create a new portfolio piece

    • Preparing a submission for the AMI Salon

    • Working toward your CMI certification

    • Trying out a new medium or technique (e.g., gouache, ZBrush, After Effects, etc.)

    • Revisiting an old sketch or concept you’ve always wanted to refine

    • Or maybe you just miss illustrating anatomy and want to reconnect with what brought you into this field...

    Have fun with it—we can’t wait to see what you create! 🚀

  • This challenge is open to all BMCers, including alumni, current students, and faculty.

    We welcome individual, group, and studio submissions—so whether you're working solo or collaborating, we encourage you to participate!

  • Submit your piece here! We are channeling our inner Linda Wilson-Pauwels—so remember to sign your work!

    This goes without saying, but all participants retain all rights to their work. Submissions will only be used to promote the event and celebrate our community’s contributions!

    Submission link: https://forms.gle/Jse6Zr8i6sh59uXBA

    What happens next?

    Your work will be printed and featured on a gallery wall at BMC until December! We’ll also create a collage image of all submissions, which will be shared on our social platforms.

Return to BMC80 main page.

David Mazierski honoured with IMS Faculty Recognition Award for mentorship

A man in a suit holds an award certificate.

David Mazierski, associate professor in the Master of Science in Biomedical Communications (MScBMC) program, has been recognized by the Institute of Medical Science (IMS) with a Faculty Recognition Award for Strong Mentorship.

Dr. Mingyao Liu, director of the IMS, presented the award to all recipients at IMS Scientific Day on April 25, 2025.

In a congratulatory letter, Dr. Liu noted that as a graduate supervisor and member of numerous advisory committees, Mazierski has demonstrated “great responsibility, patience, and commitment to the mentorship of each graduate student.” He added that Mazierski has been “essential to the academic success” of many students.

Professor Michael Corrin, director of the MScBMC program, described Mazierski as “an enthusiastic mentor and instructor.”

“He’s always excited to meet with students to talk shop and exchange ideas,” Corrin said. “His passion for what we do is infectious. Students feed off his never-ending curiosity and incredible knowledge of our discipline.”

Corrin added, “This award is well deserved and a testament to his more than 30 years of student guidance and training.”

BMC 80–Speaker Series 2025: Mesa Schumacher, Medical Illustrator

Mesa Schumacher is the principal medical and scientific illustrator and animator for Mesa Studios LLC, a boutique visualization studio that finds visual solutions to communicate science, data, and ideas in popular and scientific media.

Finding Your Value–The Business of Creativity

We live in uncertain times but for creative professionals uncertainty has always been part of the job. Artists constantly navigate market fluctuations, client relationships, and long-term financial planning–often without the safety net of an employer. Mesa Schumacher began freelancing from her dorm room as an undergraduate and has spent the past two decades visualizing science and medicine while making every mistake in the freelancer’s book. In this talk, she’ll share insights on how independent artists define and market their value, attract and retain clients, and adapt to evolving industries.

Date: April 4, 2025
Time: 12 to 1 p.m. (ET)
Location: Online
Webinar Registration Link:
https://uoft.me/bmc-speaker-series-2025-mesa-schumacher
2025 BMC speaker series full program: https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/news-events/2025/01/29/bmc80-speaker-series-2025


Mesa Schumacher is an award-winning science communicator and the owner of Mesa Studios. A graduate of Stanford University and the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine’s Biological and Medical Illustration program, she works as an illustrator, writer, comic artist, and infographic designer. Her work has appeared in National Geographic, Scientific American, academic publications, educational and trade books, puzzles, games, and exhibits in zoos, aquariums, and museums. Whatever the medium, Mesa thrives on solving complex visual puzzles and creating work that sparks curiosity and challenges the mind.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mesa-schumacher-7714088/

Mesa Studios web site: https://www.mesaschumacher.com/

BMC80 Hoodies–Available only in April!

Celebrate 80 Years of BMC with a Limited-Edition Hoodie!

BMC alumni and current students can now order a special BMC80 hoodie–available for a limited time only!

This exclusive hoodie features:

  • The University of Toronto crest on the left chest

  • The years 1945–2025 embroidered on the sleeve

  • A stunning, full-colour BMC80 logo on the back

Order Deadline: April 24, 2025
Price: $44.47 + HST (Offered at cost; not a fundraiser.)

Pick up your hoodie at the BMCAA Gala.

Order now: https://secure.utm.utoronto.ca/bmc80-hoodie/product/bmc80-hoodie (Credit card required.)

Want to support BMC? Visit Giving to BMC to donate.

Return to BMC80 main page.

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Links referenced:

BMCAA Gala https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/news-events/bmc80-alumni-gala

Hoodie Order Form https://secure.utm.utoronto.ca/bmc80-hoodie/product/bmc80-hoodie

Giving to BMC https://bmc.med.utoronto.ca/giving-to-bmc

BMC80 main page https://www.bmcaa.com

BMC alum creates captivating cover for OVPRI's annual report

Naomi Wee, MScBMC Class of '24, brought research to life through art as the cover illustrator for Synergy, the Office of the Vice Principal, Research and Innovation's 2024 annual report.

Her illustration–a building constructed from books–depicts the dynamism and diversity of research at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Each "floor" highlights a key seasonal event:

Top Floor (Summer): The INSPIRE program, which prepares top science students for graduate studies, and SURF, the Summer Undergraduate Research Fair;

Middle Floor (Fall): The Celebration of Books, which showcases works authored and edited by UTM scholars;

Bottom Floor (Winter): The Research Excellence Prizes, which honour the achievements of early-career researchers in the Humanities, Sciences and Social Sciences; and the Annual Research Excellence Lecture.

Naomi says that this was an incredible opportunity to collaborate with the OVPRI's communications team who "gave me full creative freedom over the project. As a medical illustrator, it was really interesting to think about how we can depict different research disciplines that don’t necessarily involve biology or chemistry."

Naomi Wee is a medical illustrator at Bootcamp.com.

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Web sites referenced

Naomi Wee's online portfolio https://www.naomiwee.com

Synergy, OVPRI 2024 Annual Report https://bit.ly/OVPRI-Report-24

BMC Fall Open House–Update

First offered in September 2022, the BMC Open House was a response to the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns that moved all interviews online. The Open House provided an additional opportunity for applicants to connect with us in person in the event of a February 2023 lockdown.

We continued to offer the in-person Open House until 2024, but now it’s time to say goodbye. The Open House has served its purpose, and we are moving forward.

Applicants who are invited for interviews will still have the opportunity to attend their interviews in person.

Thanks to everyone at BMC and UTM who made the Open House a success. We look forward to meeting future invited applicants in person on Interview Day.

Artificial Intelligence in medical illustration: catastrophe or opportunity?

On January 31, 2025, BMC faculty members Shehryar Saharan and Nicholas Woolridge organized an AI information session for faculty and students. The session aimed to review the current state of AI, address ethical and practical concerns, and introduce helpful AI tools. The presentation, titled Artificial Intelligence in Scientific Visualization: A Catastropportunity, highlighted the dual potential of these technologies—catastrophic in some contexts and applications but also presenting opportunities. 

Contributors, including second year student Priya Modi, faculty Dave Mazierski and Derek Ng, and sessional lecturers Man-San Ma and Alexander Young, showed a variety their own experiments with and applications of generative AI in scientific visualization. 

AI tools and techniques have gained public attention in recent years with the release of chatbots like ChatGPT and Claude, and image generation tools like Dall-E and Stable Diffusion. These tools leverage advancements in AI techniques, such as neural networks, and the increasing power of specialized computer hardware. 

ChatGPT and Claude are large-language models (LLMs) trained on vast corpora of written information. Image generation models, trained on billions of images, often produce uncannily artistic-looking images. The availability of these technologies raises concerns about their impact on artists, writers, and other workers potentially displaced by their outputs. 

Medical illustrators are particularly concerned about whether these tools pose a threat to their profession. The workshop addressed some of these ethical concerns: 

  • Intellectual property: Many large datasets are sourced from human creators without consent or compensation. 

  • Privacy: Personal data can be inadvertently included in the training data due to the insatiable demand for data. 

  • Accountability: Most AI systems lack transparency about the source of their models or training data, making it challenging to assess ethics or assign responsibility for issues. 

  • Environmental impact: Training and running AI models are highly energy- and water-intensive

Human flourishing, equity, and human exploitation are all concerns that arise when considering the impact of AI on society. For instance, AI models can inadvertently reflect biases present in the culture from which they are developed, leading to potential discrimination and unfair treatment. Additionally, many individuals employed to review and validate AI outputs are often found in developing countries, where these positions may be characterized by low wages, unfair conditions, or exploitation. 

In the context of medical illustration, there are also practical concerns associated with the use of AI tools, particularly image generation. One significant challenge is the accuracy of AI systems. They can sometimes generate inaccurate or misleading images, which could potentially lead to errors or poor outcomes in medical applications. Another concern is the novelty of AI-generated content. While our field often involves depicting new biological phenomena, procedures, and devices, AI, which essentially remixes and regurgitates what it was trained on, is currently struggling to produce truly novel creations. 

Furthermore, organizations that rely on inaccurate AI-derived materials may face legal liability for errors or adverse consequences. Additionally, copyright issues arise with AI-generated images, as they are currently not protected by copyright law. This means that clients may have to consider the possibility that their AI-generated images could be reused or altered by others. 

There are tools available that by chance or design do not run into the ethical or practical concerns mentioned. These more ethical tools are typically trained on ethical datasets and have a more assistive rather than generative nature. For example, one recent tool from Adobe can separate glass reflections from objects behind the glass in photographs. Another tool integrated into the animation program Cascadeur can infer skeletal motion from video sources, which is particularly beneficial for 3D animation of human characters. Both of these tools were developed ethically and have the potential to accomplish tasks that were previously impossible or extremely challenging. 

Workshop co-organizers Saharan and Woolridge hope to offer another session in Summer 2025.