392169 Projekt "Virtuelle Realität: Immersive Document Browser" (PjS) (SoSe 2015)

In the project Virtual Reality theoretical and practical knowledge obtained in the lecture and the tutorial on Virtual Reality are trained and deepened in a practical application.

The specific project title is:
Immersive Document Browser – Desktop 3.0

Language: The project may be held in German or English, depending on the participants.

General goal of the Project
The purpose of the project is to create an immersive 3D browser for text documents and other multi-media documents. This immersive document may be oriented on the virtual desktop envisioned in Heavy Rain (ARI) (http://youtu.be/SsQT3mbvVWY) or the interface seen in Minority Report.

The work on the design of the immersive 3D document browser has been started in the tutorials. In the project, we will extend the interaction capabilities and connect the browser to a real database, so that we can retrieve and manipulate real data.

This project will be run in close cooperation with the company CEYONIQ and if the final results are convincing, they may be presented in the Showroom at CEYONIQ/Bielefeld.

Target Platform: Oculus Rift DK2 + Microsoft Kinect 2.0 + SeeThrough Option

Specific Goals:

• The user should be able to connect to the document management system by our industry partner CEYONIQ. The user should be able to retrieve all content that is presented by the immersive interface from the repository.
• The user should be able to retrieve specific documents from the repository and present them on her virtual desktop.
• The user should be sitting in front of a virtual desktop and be able to interact with different text documents and linked multimedia content.
• Several specific use cases shall be implemented, which allow the user to manage data in the repository using the immersive interface. Examples are: linking or grouping of documents, searching for documents, sharing documents with others, retrieving linked multimedia data and browsing them.

Procedure
The procedure of the project is oriented on the process of scientific research.

Phase 1 (April): State of the Art and Planning
In the beginning, all participants will discuss the current state of the art regarding immersive or future desktops. Relevant scientific questions will then be formulated and the application design will be developed.

Phase 2 (Mai-June): Implementation
Depending on the number of participants, groups will be formed which work on a dedicated aspect of the implementation of the design. The planned interaction methods will be implemented.

Phase 3 (June-July): Evaluation
The implemented immersive visual desktop will be evaluated in a small user study.

Remarks:
The project makes it easy for students of different disciplines and of different backgrounds to complement each other. While participants of the lecture on Virtual Reality may focus on the design and implementation of the interaction methods, participants of the lecture "Mensch-Maschine-Interaktion" (Human Machine Interaction) may develop the interaction concept and evaluate the implementation.

As a conclusion of the project, a report will be written. This report will be in the shape of a scientific paper, which might be even submitted to a real scientific workshop, such as the German Workshop for Virtual and Augmented Reality. Participants of the project, in particular those following a master's program, will learn how to structure and write a scientific article. If the article is accepted, participants will also have the chance to present their work on a real scientific workshop (on their own expense).

This project may lay the foundation for many interesting questions or application problems which could be addressed in a bachelor or master thesis.

Requirements for participation, required level

• Lecture on Virtual Reality OR Human-Machine-Interaction
• Participation in the tutorials on Virtual Reality is recommended
• The modelling and programming knowledge required for this project will be comparable to what has been done in the tutorials

Bibliography

• X3D : extensible 3D graphics for web authors by Don Brutzman and Leonard Daly
• X3D : Programmierung interaktiver 3D-Anwendungen für das Internet by Jörg H. Kloss