After all the awards were handed out at the closing ceremony, Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, as seen on TV's MythBusters, came on stage to give a demonstration of how a GPU differs from a CPU. And in true MythBuster's style they did it with a combination of robotics, devices that would make Rube Goldberg envious, and things that go "boom" (in this case, paintball guns).

First up was their concept of the serial processing of a CPU. They devised a robot, which they dubbed "Leonardo," that rapid-fired paintballs at a target, creating the image of a smiley face. It was a pretty impressive sight, at least until the audience saw what came next. Leonardo did a good job, but wasn't up the challenge of creating a more complex work of art.

Then they unveiled their machine to simultaneously fired 1102 paint balls, a metaphor for the parallel processing power of a GPU, producing a copy of that most famous smile of all, the Mona Lisa.

It was an original, entertaining, and insightful end to a great conference.

See you all at NVISION 09.

One of the most exciting events of NVISION was part of the professional track. The Emerging Companies Summit gathered together 350 people from 60 up-and-coming visual companies to collaborate and learn from one another.

These companies have produced some of the most exciting innovations in visual computing that have been seen in years, many of which were on display in the Exhibit Hall or demonstrated during various presentations during NVISION 08.

Two companies in particular were called out during the NVISION 08 closing ceremony as deserving of special notice.

The award for Best Application of Visual Computing went to Total Immersion for their concept of "augmented reality," which combines features of the real world with a virtual environment.

And the award for Most Promising Emerging Company went to Nurien Software, for their work in combining graphics, virtual worlds, and social networking.

The finals of the Electronic Sports World Cup were held in conjunction with NVISION. Teams of professional gamers from 53 countries battled it out for the title of best in the world in five games. The winners of the tournaments were as follows:

Counterstrike: PGS.MYM, Poland

Counterstrike Women: SK-GAMING, USA

Quake 3: CYPHER, Belarus

DOTA: ZENITH, Singapore

Warcraft 3: WHO, Korea

Trackmania: FROST BUELE, Sweden

The NVScene program at NVISION 08 comprised the art, Demoscene, and Machinima programs. Demoscene is a community of artists, coders, and musicians who gather to create real-time, animated art. Machinima (machine + cinema) is the art of using game engines to create animation.

The winners of the NVArt competition were:

1. Fusion, by Heiko Klug (seen above)
2. Cock and the Centipede, by Jason Lynch
3. When Tliali Calls You, by Carlos Ortega Elizalde

The Best Demoscene Demos were:

1. Stargazer, by Andromeda & Orb
2. Into the Pink, by Plastic

The Best Demoscene 4K Demos were:

1. Texas, by Keyboarders
2. Receptor, by TBC

The Machinima award went to Server Side, by Cyphermind

And the NVISION 08 Judge's Award went to The Ship, by Mednios

Results of the GeForce LAN tournaments are in.

Winner of Call of Duty 4 is Nexus.

Winner of Team Fortress 2 is Pandemic.

Winner of Unreal Tournament 3 is Rafik Bryant.

Winner of Guitar Hero 3 is Thomas Burke.

Winner of World in Conflict is Don't Care.

Congrats to all the winners!

Over 8,000 people have attended NVISION.

Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage, TV's MythBusters were on hand this morning in the Exhibit Hall to greet NVISION attendees and sign autographs.

You can see more of Jamie and Adam at the NVISION 08 Closing Ceremony, 3 P.M. in the Center for Performing Arts. There they will debut one of their infamous contraptions designed especially for NVISION.

203 of the most hardcore gamers in the world just set the Guinness World Record for the longest continuous LAN party with over 100 participants. They kept going for 36 straight hours!

It took a lot of stamina and dedication to go the distance.

Congrats to all the participants!

The two big NVISION 08 Passport Program winners were drawn this morning.

Patty Leung won the Mitsubishi 40-inch 1080p LCD HDTV and Shuttle PC and Ramin Davarpanah won the Mitsubishi 73-inch 1080p Diamond Rear-Projection TV.

Congrats to the winners and thanks to PNY and Zotac for sponsoring the contest!

With less than two hours to go, it looks like about 200 of the hardcore gamers in the Guinness World Record attempt will complete the 36 hours to set the record.

The record attempt finishes up at 11 A.M. this morning. A minimum of 100 gamers finishing is required, so it looks very good at the moment.