Global search for occlusion minimisation in virtual camera control

This paper presents a fast and reliable global-search approach to the problem of virtual camera positioning when multiple objects that need to be within the reach of the camera are fully occluded. For this purpose, a comparative analysis of global-search algorithms is presented for the problem of maximising camera visibility across different tasks of varying complexity and within different real-time windows. A custom-designed genetic algorithm is compared to octree-based search and random search and results showcase the advantages of the genetic algorithm proposed with respect to efficiency, robustness and computational effort.peer-reviewe

Shifting niches for community structure detection

We present a new evolutionary algorithm for community structure detection in both undirected and unweighted (sparse) graphs and fully connected weighted digraphs (complete networks). Previous investigations have found that, although evolutionary computation can identify community structure in complete networks, this approach seems to scale badly due to solutions with the wrong number of communities dominating the population. The new algorithm is based on a niching model, where separate compartments of the population contain candidate solutions with different numbers of communities. We experimentally compare the new algorithm to the well-known algorithms of Pizzuti and Tasgin, and find that we outperform those algorithms for sparse graphs under some conditions, and drastically outperform them on complete networks under all tested conditions.peer-reviewe

Evolving card sets towards balancing dominion

In this paper we use the popular card game Dominion as a complex test-bed for the generation of interesting and balanced game rules. Dominion is a trading-card-like game where each card type represents a different game mechanic. Each playthrough only features ten different cards, the selection of which can form a new game each time. We compare and analyse three different agents that are capable of playing Dominion on different skill levels and use three different fitness functions to generate balanced card sets. Results reveal that there are particular cards of the game that lead to balanced games independently of player skill and behaviour. The approach taken could be used to balance other games with decomposable game mechanics.peer-reviewe