Pasado, presente y futuro de la Realidad Virtual: análisis a partir de las variables tecnológica y de definición del término

Developments in Virtual Reality (VR) technology are currently arousing great scientific interest because in just a few years, VR has found its niche not only in the specialised public, but also in society in general and in different contexts, thanks to its many uses in different contexts and the decreasing price of VR viewing devices. To many, this technology may appear to be a novelty of the 21st century, but its origins go back several decades. Taking into account these aspects, this article aims to analyse the past and present of VR from two perspectives: one focused on its technological development and one on its conceptual evolution. This historical overview, in turn, will allow us to address the future applications of VR in different disciplines. The study provides the reader with an indepth analysis of VR that will contribute to the understanding of this technology and its uses.Hoy en día todo lo relacionado con la Realidad Virtual (RV) despierta un gran interés científico. Tal es así que en pocos años ha conseguido hacerse un hueco no solo entre el público especializado, sino también entre la sociedad en general, ya que, sus aplicaciones son muchas y en diferentes contextos. Este hecho ha sido posible en gran medida gracias al imparable desarrollo tecnológico y al abaratamiento de los dispositivos de visualización. Parecería, por tanto, que esta tecnología es una novedad del sigo XXI, pero lo cierto es que sus orígenes se remontan varias décadas en el pasado. Teniendo en cuenta estos aspectos, este artículo tiene como objetivo analizar el pasado y el presente de la RV desde una doble perspectiva: la que tiene que ver, por una parte, con su desarrollo tecnológico y, por otra, con la definición del término. Dicho recorrido histórico, a su vez, permitirá abordar las perspectivas de futuro de la RV desde el punto de vista de sus aplicaciones dentro de diferentes disciplinas. Todo ello dotará al lector de una visión en profundidad acerca de la tecnología de la RV que servirá para comprender

The Rocketbox Library and the Utility of Freely Available Rigged Avatars

As part of the open sourcing of the Microsoft Rocketbox avatar library for research and academic purposes, here we discuss the importance of rigged avatars for the Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR, AR) research community. Avatars, virtual representations of humans, are widely used in VR applications. Furthermore many research areas ranging from crowd simulation to neuroscience, psychology, or sociology have used avatars to investigate new theories or to demonstrate how they influence human performance and interactions. We divide this paper in two main parts: the first one gives an overview of the different methods available to create and animate avatars. We cover the current main alternatives for face and body animation as well introduce upcoming capture methods. The second part presents the scientific evidence of the utility of using rigged avatars for embodiment but also for applications such as crowd simulation and entertainment. All in all this paper attempts to convey why rigged avatars will be key to the future of VR and its wide adoption

Utilizing modern virtual reality technology in software development for city planning

The use of virtual reality technology in the field of city planning has grown during the recent decades, because virtual reality provides a highly informative and immersive experience of an urban area in contrast to traditionally used 2-dimensional material, such as imagery and animations. This makes communication and decision making between the stakeholders of a city planning project much more efficient and enables participating the public to the process, which is very desirable in city planning projects. The virtual reality technology has evolved dramatically during the past few years. Devices such as head-mounted displays, spatial controllers and CAVE installations, and developing environments, such as game engines and 3D modeling studios have become more available for consumers and developers. Therefore, the opportunities for virtual reality technology requires revisiting. The goal of this study is to find software development opportunities for city planning projects using virtual reality technologies and realize those opportunities by implementing a model solution for use cases that show the most potential for development. The model solution is a high-level modeling tool, which can be used for fast drafting and modeling of city-scale plans, and provides appealing visualization for presentation purposes. This allows architects to make changes to the city plan immediately as they are receiving feedback from the decision makers and other stakeholders of a city planning project. This makes the decision making much faster, as the modifications can be made during the meeting, instead of re-scheduling another meeting to see the changes to the plan. The model solution also allows viewing the plan in a highly immersive virtual reality environment, with devices such as head-mounted displays. The development of this software is executed following well known agile methodologies used in commercial software development projects and is extended with a literature review and an analysis of the functionality of the model solution. The literature review charts the existing applications and studies of virtual reality in city planning so that opportunities for further development can be found. From these opportunities, the use cases showing the most potential are chosen and refined to a concept of an application. This concept is then refined to concrete designs and implemented in iterations, producing a final solution. The final solution is then analyzed in a test setup, including 8 participants, who are given city planning tasks, and answers a survey afterward, affirming that the model solution is a useful tool for future city planning projects

Periodismo inmersivo y su vertiente social: la utilización de la realidad virtual y el vídeo en 360º en el panorama mediático actual

[ES]La aplicación de la realidad virtual (RV) y del vídeo en 360º para la elaboración de contenidos informativos ha abierto un nuevo camino de posibilidades a la profesión periodística. Este tipo de producciones, bajo la denominación de periodismo inmersivo, ofrece a los usuarios la posibilidad de sumergirse en el relato mediante la utilización de cascos o gafas de RV. Tras una profunda revisión teórica que llevará al lector a un viaje hacia el pasado hasta el origen de la tecnología de la realidad virtual, esta tesis doctoral repasará los principales cambios experimentados en el ámbito periodístico a raíz de la irrupción de Internet y de las tecnologías digitales; hasta llegar, finalmente, a la aparición de los primeros proyectos de periodismo inmersivo. Mediante el análisis de más de 2.000 proyectos, este estudio busca realizar un acercamiento a este nuevo formato que utiliza la tecnología de la realidad virtual y el vídeo en 360º a fin de establecer diferentes modelos de análisis que puedan servir a futuros investigadores a la hora de abordar este tipo de producciones

Virtualisation d'interfaces matérielles : proposition, implémentation et évaluation d'un nouveau paradigme d'interactions humain-machine

RÉSUMÉ En acquérant de nouvelles fonctions, les machines environnantes ont vu leur interface se complexifier. Cette évolution rapide et non-contrôlée a mené à des interactions humainmachine moins performantes, forçant deux courants de pensées à émerger. Puisant dans l’informatique pervasive, le premier a favorisé le développement de machines intelligentes, en les augmentant de multiples senseurs pour automatiser la plupart de leurs fonctionnalités, afin de décharger leur interface et limiter les interactions humainmachine aux actions strictement essentielles. Le deuxième s’est concentré, entre autres, sur la formulation de philosophies de design (design centré sur l’utilisateur, conception pour tous, interfaces unifiées…) et sur l’élaboration de méthodes d’évaluation (cognitive walkthrough, évaluations heuristiques…), afin de simplifier et de standardiser ces interfaces. Bien que ces recherches ont et continuent de façonner le monde des interfaces humain-machine tel que nous le connaissons, il nous reste encore beaucoup de progrès à faire pour offrir, à chaque utilisateur et dans un marché de masse, des interfaces optimales et minimales, répondant spécifiquement à leurs besoins, à leurs modèles mentaux et à leurs préférences individuels.----------ABSTRACT As machines acquired new capabilities, their interfaces ultimately became more complex. This unrestrained and rapid evolution led to problematic man-machine interactions, forcing two currents of thought to emerge. Drawing upon pervasive computing, the first moved towards intelligent machines, using multiple sensors to automate most of their functionalities, to streamline their interfaces and to limit manmachine interactions to essential actions. The second focused, among other concepts, on design philosophies (user-centered design, design for all, unified interfaces…) and evaluation methods (cognitive walkthrough, heuristic evaluations…), in a quest to simplify and standardize these interfaces. While such research shaped and continues to shape the world of man-machine interfaces as we know it, we are still far from offering, in a mass-market environment, ideal and minimal interfaces, tailored to a user’s specific and individual needs, mental models and preferences