Abstract. It is well known that the ring of polynomial invariants of a reductive group is finitely generated. However, it is difficult to give strong upper bounds on the degrees of the generators, especially over fields of positive characteristic. In this paper, we make use of the theory of good filtrations along with recent results on the null cone to provide polynomial bounds for matrix semi-invariants in arbitrary characteristic, and consequently for matrix invariants. Our results generalize to invariants and semi-invariants of quivers.