Redefining Access to Large Audiovisual Archives through Embodied Experiences in Immersive Environments: Creativity & Cognition 2022 -- Graduate Student Symposium

Audiovisual archives are the mnemonic archives of the 21st century, with important cultural institutions increasingly digitizing their video collections. However, these remain mostly inaccessible, due to the sheer amount of content combined with the lack of innovative forms of engagement through compelling frameworks for their exploration. The present research therefore aims at redefining access to large video collections through embodied experiences in immersive environments. The author claims that, once users are empowered to be actors of the experience rather than mere spectators, their creativity is stimulated and narrative can emerge.Comment: Proceedings of the 14th Conference on Creativity and Cognitio

Addressing the challenges of ECMO simulation

This document is the Accepted Manuscript. The final, definitive version of this paper has been published in Perfusion, May 2018, published by SAGE Publishing, All rights reserved.Introduction/Aim: The patient’s condition and high-risk nature of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) therapy force clinical services to ensure clinicians are properly trained and always ready to deal effectively with critical situations. Simulation-based education (SBE), from the simplest approaches to the most immersive modalities, helps promote optimum individual and team performance. The risks of SBE are negative learning, inauthenticity in learning and over-reliance on the participants’ suspension of disbelief. This is especially relevant to ECMO SBE as circuit/patient interactions are difficult to fully simulate without confusing circuit alterations. Methods: Our efforts concentrate on making ECMO simulation easier and more realistic in order to reduce the current gap there is between SBE and real ECMO patient care. Issues to be overcome include controlling the circuit pressures, system failures, patient issues, blood colour and cost factors. Key to our developments are the hospital-university collaboration and research funding. Results: A prototype ECMO simulator has been developed that allows for realistic ECMO SBE. The system emulates the ECMO machine interface with remotely controllable pressure parameters, haemorrhaging, line chattering, air bubble noise and simulated blood colour change. Conclusion: The prototype simulator allows the simulation of common ECMO emergencies through innovative solutions that enhance the fidelity of ECMO SBE and reduce the requirement for suspension of disbelief from participants. Future developments will encompass the patient cannulation aspect.Peer reviewe

Immersive Analytics of Large Dynamic Networks via Overview and Detail Navigation

Analysis of large dynamic networks is a thriving research field, typically relying on 2D graph representations. The advent of affordable head mounted displays however, sparked new interest in the potential of 3D visualization for immersive network analytics. Nevertheless, most solutions do not scale well with the number of nodes and edges and rely on conventional fly- or walk-through navigation. In this paper, we present a novel approach for the exploration of large dynamic graphs in virtual reality that interweaves two navigation metaphors: overview exploration and immersive detail analysis. We thereby use the potential of state-of-the-art VR headsets, coupled with a web-based 3D rendering engine that supports heterogeneous input modalities to enable ad-hoc immersive network analytics. We validate our approach through a performance evaluation and a case study with experts analyzing a co-morbidity network

Collaborative and Multi-Modal Mixed Reality for Enhancing Cultural Learning in Virtual Heritage

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Immersive Insights: A Hybrid Analytics System for Collaborative Exploratory Data Analysis

In the past few years, augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) technologies have experienced terrific improvements in both accessibility and hardware capabilities, encouraging the application of these devices across various domains. While researchers have demonstrated the possible advantages of AR and VR for certain data science tasks, it is still unclear how these technologies would perform in the context of exploratory data analysis (EDA) at large. In particular, we believe it is important to better understand which level of immersion EDA would concretely benefit from, and to quantify the contribution of AR and VR with respect to standard analysis workflows. In this work, we leverage a Dataspace reconfigurable hybrid reality environment to study how data scientists might perform EDA in a co-located, collaborative context. Specifically, we propose the design and implementation of Immersive Insights, a hybrid analytics system combining high-resolution displays, table projections, and augmented reality (AR) visualizations of the data. We conducted a two-part user study with twelve data scientists, in which we evaluated how different levels of data immersion affect the EDA process and compared the performance of Immersive Insights with a state-of-the-art, non-immersive data analysis system.Comment: VRST 201

VIRTUAL MUSEUMS AS A MEANS FOR PROMOTION AND ENHANCEMENT OF CULTURAL HERITAGE

Abstract. The use of virtual reality and ICT in the museum context provides a new key to understand and promote Cultural Heritage: thanks to these technologies the user has the opportunity to experience without the need to come into contact with the real objects. For the museum institutions VR and ICT are a valuable tool that allows them to perform different cultural tasks, addressing the public in a much more effective way than has previously been possible. Especially through VR, it is possible to reconstruct the original context of the artworks through the interconnection of contents: the virtual visitor, while viewing the artwork, can consult useful contents for the learning process. Another revolutionary element introduced by the new technologies is linked to the possibility of creating virtual exhibitions through which it is possible to exhibit works that are not accessible or not visible. These reflections and these theoretical principles were the basis for the development of the project proposal presented in these pages, that was born as a collaboration between the R3D Lab of the Museo della Rappresentazione of University of Catania and the CIMS Lab of Carleton University, Ottawa. It consists in the creation of a virtual museum, the Timeless Museum, in order to create an educational experience, able to make the users reflect on topics such as the value of history, the sense of beauty, the relationship with our past and our future, the protection and transmission to future generations of the artistic heritage we have.</p

Go With The Flow: Examining The Effects Of Engagement Using Flow Theory And It\u27s Relationship To Achievement And Performance

Virtual Worlds have become an attractive platform for work, play, and learning. Businesses, including the public sector and academia, are increasingly investing their time, money, and attention to understanding the value of virtual worlds as a productivity tool. For example, educators are leading the way with research in Second Life, one of the more popular virtual worlds, as a potentially powerful medium for creating and delivering instruction. Still, little is empirically known about the value of virtual worlds as viable learning platforms. This study examined the instructional potential of Second Life for creating engaging activities, and to investigate the relationship between Second Life and learning in educational settings. It was hypothesized that a positive relationship exists between a learner\u27s level of engagement and achievement. Achievement was assessed as a learner\u27s level of recognition and recall of factual content. It was also hypothesized that a positive relationship exists between a learner\u27s level of engagement and their performance. Performance was assessed as a learner\u27s level of participation, initiative and effort. Additionally, exploratory research was conducted to examine the factors that contributed to both performance and engagement. Lastly, the relationship between other demographic factors of age, Second Life skill level, and ethnicity, with engagement was explored. This research used an empirically tested unit of web-based instructional framework known as a WebQuest. A 3D version, named VWQuest, was created in Second Life. One hundred volunteers completed participation. Using role play, participants participated in a quest for information. While exploring, participants were asked to take photos as evidence of their experiences. Upon completion, they took a knowledge check multiple-choice quiz, and a survey which measured their perceived level of engagement during the activity. Regression analysis indicated no positive correlation between a participant\u27s level of engagement and his or her achievement. However, a positive correlation was found between participants\u27 level of engagement and their performance. Second Life skill level was significantly correlated to performance, and engagement was found to be a mediator between skill level and performance. Most significantly and unexpectedly, participants\u27 performance varied so greatly, the performance rubric was revised four times before it comprehensively captured the diverse range of performances. This evidence suggests that open-ended and creative opportunities to perform yield levels of creativity, engagement, and innovation within immersive platforms, unexpected and far beyond that of traditional instructional settings. Investigating flow dimensions, engagement elements of user control and loss of time were found to be the most significant contributors to performance, and accounted for the greatest amount of variance in explaining performance. Confirmatory factor analysis showed that the flow factors of defined goals and feedback loaded the highest, suggesting a strong relationship between the two factors. Demographic analysis revealed no significant mean difference between gender and engagement, or between age and engagement. The majority of participants were between 40 and 50 and was instructors or educators, not students. For those interested in understanding appropriate and effective instruction in complex, immersive environments, this study brings together new important implications for all of them. Instructional designers may benefit from these findings in their creation of instructional content; instructors may benefit in their curriculum design and teaching methods; and researchers may understand specific facets with instructional potential--engagement factors, technologies, and instructional frameworks--worthy of further investigation