Sonic interaction with a virtual orchestra of factory machinery

This paper presents an immersive application where users receive sound and visual feedbacks on their interactions with a virtual environment. In this application, the users play the part of conductors of an orchestra of factory machines since each of their actions on interaction devices triggers a pair of visual and audio responses. Audio stimuli were spatialized around the listener. The application was exhibited during the 2013 Science and Music day and designed to be used in a large immersive system with head tracking, shutter glasses and a 10.2 loudspeaker configuration.Comment: Sonic Interaction for Virtual Environments, Minneapolis : United States (2014

Collaborative Virtual Training with Physical and Communicative Autonomous Agents

International audienceVirtual agents are a real asset in collaborative virtual environment for training (CVET) as they can replace missing team members. Collaboration between such agents and users, however, is generally limited. We present here a whole integrated model of CVET focusing on the abstraction of the real or virtual nature of the actor to define a homogenous collaboration model. First, we define a new collaborative model of interaction. This model notably allows to abstract the real or virtual nature of a teammate. Moreover, we propose a new role exchange approach so that actors can swap their roles during training. The model also permits the use of physically based objects and characters animation to increase the realism of the world. Second, we design a new communicative agent model, which aims at improving collaboration with other actors using dialog to coordinate their actions and to share their knowledge. Finally, we evaluated the proposed model to estimate the resulting benefits for the users and we show that this is integrated in existing CVET applications

An interaction abstraction model for seamless avatar exchange in CVET

International audienceCollaboration and interaction between users and virtual humans in virtual environments is a crucial challenge, notably for Collaborative Virtual Environments for Training (CVET). A training procedure, indeed, often involves several actors: trainees, teammates and many times a trainer. Yet, a major benefit of CVET is to propose to users to be trained even if the required number of person needed by the procedure is not available. Therefore, almost every CVET use autonomous virtual humans to replace the missing person. In this paper, we present the main results of our project that aims at improving the effective collaboration between users and virtual humans involved in a complex task within CVET. Using an entity called the "Shell", we are able to wrap the features common to both users and virtual humans. It gives us an abstraction level to pool the management of the main processes useful to control an avatar, interact with the environment and gather knowledge from a CVET. Besides, the Shell allows seamless exchange of avatars during a procedure. Thanks to the Shell, the exchange can be carried out at any time during a task while preserving all the data associated to a role in a procedure

Collaborative Virtual Training with Physical and Communicative Autonomous Agents

International audienceVirtual agents are a real asset in collaborative virtual environment for training (CVET) as they can replace missing team members. Collaboration between such agents and users, however, is generally limited. We present here a whole integrated model of CVET focusing on the abstraction of the real or virtual nature of the actor to define a homogenous collaboration model. First, we define a new collaborative model of interaction. This model notably allows to abstract the real or virtual nature of a teammate. Moreover, we propose a new role exchange approach so that actors can swap their roles during training. The model also permits the use of physically based objects and characters animation to increase the realism of the world. Second, we design a new communicative agent model, which aims at improving collaboration with other actors using dialog to coordinate their actions and to share their knowledge. Finally, we evaluated the proposed model to estimate the resulting benefits for the users and we show that this is integrated in existing CVET applications

Expressive potentials of motion capture in the Vis Insita musical performance

International audienc

#FIVE : High-Level Components for Developing Collaborative and Interactive Virtual Environments

International audienceThis paper presents #FIVE (Framework for Interactive Virtual Environments), a framework for the development of interactive and collaborative virtual environments. #FIVE has been developed to answer the need for an easier and a faster conception and development of virtual reality applications. It has been designed with a constant focus on re-usability with as few hypothesis as possible on the final application in which it could be used. Whatever the chosen implementation for the Virtual Environment (VE), #FIVE : (1) provides a toolkit that eases the declaration of possible actions and behaviours of objects in the VE, (2) provides a toolkit that facilitates the setting and the management of collaborative interactions in a VE, (3) is compliant with distribution of the VE on different setups and (4) proposes guidelines to efficiently create a collabo-rative and interactive VE. It is composed of several modules, among them, two core modules : the relation engine and the collabora-tive interaction engine. On the one hand, the relation engine manages the relations between the objects of the environment. On the other hand, the collaborative interaction engine manages how users can collaboratively control objects. The modules that compose the #FIVE framework can be used either independently or simultaneously , depending on the requirements of the application. They can also communicate and work with other modules thanks to an API. For instance, a scenario engine can be plugged to any or both of the #FIVE modules if the application is scenario-based. #FIVE is a work in progress, new core modules will later be proposed. Nevertheless , it has already been used in some VR applications by several persons in our lab. The feedbacks we obtained are rather positive and we intent to further develop #FIVE with additional functional-ities, notably by extending it to the control of avatars whether they are controlled by a user or by the system

Design of an immersive simulator for assisted power wheelchair driving

International audienceDriving a power wheelchair is a difficult and complex visual-cognitive task. As a result, some people with visual and/or cognitive disabilities cannot access the benefits of a power wheelchair because their impairments prevent them from driving safely. In order to improve their access to mobility, we have previously designed a semi-autonomous assistive wheelchair system which progressively corrects the trajectory as the user manually drives the wheelchair and smoothly avoids obstacles. Developing and testing such systems for wheelchair driving assistance requires a significant amount of material resources and clinician time. With Virtual Reality technology, prototypes can be developed and tested in a risk-free and highly flexible Virtual Environment before equipping and testing a physical prototype. Additionally, users can " virtually " test and train more easily during the development process. In this paper, we introduce a power wheelchair driving simulator allowing the user to navigate with a standard wheelchair in an immersive 3D Virtual Environment. The simulation framework is designed to be flexible so that we can use different control inputs. In order to validate the framework, we first performed tests on the simulator with able-bodied participants during which the user's Quality of Experience (QoE) was assessed through a set of questionnaires. Results show that the simulator is a promising tool for future works as it generates a good sense of presence and requires rather low cognitive effort from users

An interaction abstraction model for seamless avatar exchange in CVET

International audienceCollaboration and interaction between users and virtual humans in virtual environments is a crucial challenge, notably for Collaborative Virtual Environments for Training (CVET). A training procedure, indeed, often involves several actors: trainees, teammates and many times a trainer. Yet, a major benefit of CVET is to propose to users to be trained even if the required number of person needed by the procedure is not available. Therefore, almost every CVET use autonomous virtual humans to replace the missing person. In this paper, we present the main results of our project that aims at improving the effective collaboration between users and virtual humans involved in a complex task within CVET. Using an entity called the "Shell", we are able to wrap the features common to both users and virtual humans. It gives us an abstraction level to pool the management of the main processes useful to control an avatar, interact with the environment and gather knowledge from a CVET. Besides, the Shell allows seamless exchange of avatars during a procedure. Thanks to the Shell, the exchange can be carried out at any time during a task while preserving all the data associated to a role in a procedure

Collaboration et interchangeabilité entre humains réels et humains virtuels en Environnement Virtuel de Formation

National audienceNous présentons un nouveau modèle d'interaction collaboratif permettant à plusieurs utilisateurs d'agir simultanément sur un même objet au sein d'environnements virtuels. Basé sur ce modèle, nous proposons une entité appelée Perceptive Puppet permettant de s'abstraire de la nature, réelle ou virtuelle, de l'humain dirigeant un mannequin. Cette nouvelle entité rassemble le contrôle du mannequin ainsi que l'acquisition et le stockage des connaissances qui lui sont associées. Cette abstraction permet de mettre en place l'interchangeabilité, autorisant le changement de rôle en cours de procédure tout en assurant la continuité des actions à effectuer. Afin d'illustrer ces contributions, nous montrons leurs applications dans le contexte des environnements virtuels de formation collaboratifs