Visitors will wear chromastereoptic eyewear as well as wireless headphones to visually and aurally express musical scale properties when they are stretched or compressed dynamically using the Helical Keyboard, a Java3D application developed in our laboratory. By interacting with this rich interface, the user can experiment with the dual nature of the musical scale (linear and cyclical) as well as the principles of the musical scales construction.

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This project allows medical students to interview a virtual patient to practice communication skills. Students naturally interact with life-sized virtual (projected onto a wall) people using speech and gestures. The system tracks the users head, body pose, and gestures in addition to using speech recognition software to drive a system that presents a virtual experience similar to standardized patients (paid actors used to train medical students).

We have developed a pipeline for rapid integration of real objects, such as tools and parts in engineering designs, into a ME. Instead of weeks to model, track, and integrate objects, this has been reduced to hours to get objects such as pliers, circuit boards, etc. into a ME. The system uses a combination of a laser scanner, multiple camera tracking, and a HMD and TabletPC for interaction. We have partnered with NASA engineers at NASA Langley Research Center to obtain content and end-user feedback of our ME system.

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Concavely shaped projection screens, such as CAVEs, two-sided workbenches, domes, or cylinders scatter a fraction of light to other screen portions. The amount of indirect illumination adds to the directly projected image and causes the displayed content to appear partially inconsistent and washed out. We have developed a reverse radiosity method that compensates first-level and higher-level secondary scattering effects in real-time. The images appear more brilliant and uniform when reducing the scattering contribution. A numerical solution is approximated with Jacobi iteration for a sparse-matrix linear equation system on the GPU. Efficient data structures allow packing the required data into textures which are processed by pixel shaders. Frame-buffer objects are used for a fast exchange of intermediate iteration results, and enable computations with floating point precision. Our algorithms result can be optimized for quality or performance.

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The USC Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT) has initiated a project that is creating an immersive virtual reality system for the treatment of Iraq War veterans diagnosed with combat-related Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The treatment environment is based on a creative approach to recycling and adding to the virtual assets that were initially built for the combat tactical simulation and commercially available X-Box game, Full Spectrum Warrior. The first version of the application has been created and is designed to resemble a middle-eastern city, and outlying village and desert areas. The scenario also supports a variety of user perspectives including, walking alone or within a patrol of flocking virtual soldiers, and from the vantage point of being inside a vehicle (i.e., HUMVEE, helicopter, etc.).

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Training and rehearsal are vital to maintaining warfighting capabilities. In live fire training, the cost of destroying real targets is prohibitive. Substitutes are non-reactive, stay in fixed locations, and rarely resemble real targets. This limits the quality of education; trainees are not given live fire training for firing upon moving, reactive targets. We have built a prototype augmented reality system for fire support team training. Head-mounted displays and video touchscreens allow trainees and trainers to view and control synthetic forces that appear to exist in, and interact with, the real world.

Stereo and bi-ocular head-mounted displays (HMDs) require the user to fuse two images into a coherent picture of the three-dimensional world. A vertical disparity in the graphics causes diplopia for users trying to fuse the real and virtual objects simultaneously. We implement three methods to measure and correct this disparity and assess them with a collection of a single model of optical see-through HMD.

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This platform presents a scalable architecture to compute, visualize and interact in real time with 3D dynamic textured models of real scenes. This architecture is designed for mixed reality applications requiring such dynamic models, such as tele- immersion. The system is built upon of 3 main components: image acquisition, based on standard firewire cameras; model computation, based on a distribution scheme over a cluster of PC and using an optimal shape-from-silhouette algorithm ; model visualization, which can be achieved with multiple projectors. The distribution scheme ensures the scalability of the system, interactive frame rates and low latency.

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The electromyogram (EMG) interface has been implemented in CABIN immersive multiscreen display in our laboratory. A demonstration on the EMG interface will be presented. The subject can perform a brief controlling of a simple virtual object on PC monitor.

In this research, we constructed and evaluated a wearable olfactory display to present the odor information in an outdoor environment. We will show two types of wearable olfactory display. The prototype1 wearable olfactory display system is presenting the odor by using the air pump to convey the odor air to the user's nose through tubes. The prototype2 wearable olfactory display system is using inkjet head device to inject minute odor droplets for odor presentation. And this prototype2 system is detecting the user's breathing pattern to find the best timing for the droplet injection.

To realize a photo-realistic avatar in the real world, we propose new approach to enhance the concept of video avatar to real world. By changing the images on the display panel according to the direction that the display is facing, the system can present video avatar which can be seen from all around in the real world. Based on this concept, we developed prototype system; this system consists of tablet PC with privacy filter and rotating mechanism.

As a system the virtual space and the real space coexist naturally and by which we can realize the spatial nature of would, we developed a prototype system using water drops as particles. In this system, a cluster of water drops, falling from a tank, is designed to form a planar surface. Then, patterns of images are projected from below towards the falling water drops. By projecting a set of tomographic images according to the position of water drops, three-dimensional objects can be observed without wearing a special apparatus.

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The Future Computing Lab at UNC Charlotte has been working on a variety of research projects in the areas of human-virtual human interaction, 3D user interfaces, VR travel techniques, computer vision, and computer game design. Visitors can learn more about these and other projects by chatting with one of our interactive virtual characters.

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Virtual explorations of unknown or dangerous places can be of significant advantage. Instead of using human beings, one can utilize robots with cameras to explore such places. In our system we use a ring of cameras to capture 360 degrees of field of view. This ring of cameras is mounted on a robot platform. Using computer vision algorithms, we are able to project these images in a virtual reality environment, like a 5-sided CAVE. This demonstration version will show a simulation of how the images are projected in a CAVE environment. In this simulation, the user is able to explore the panoramic image using a computer monitor. With the help of a joystick, the user will be able to control the robot carrying the cameras.

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