Interactive Multimedia Technology

Jul 26, 2010

Interesting blog roll and links on Christian Zoellner's TUI Blog by FORM+ZWECK; FILE Electronic Arts Festival

Christian Zoellner blogs about "tangible interaction & new interfaces" on the TUI Blog by Form + Zweck, a design magazine. Christian is a designer and "presearcher" who lives and works in Berlin, Germany. He teaches at the University of Fine Arts, Berlin. He maintains the Christian Zoellner website.

As I write this post, Christian is attending the FILE electronic arts festival, which focuses on "interactive art in public spaces, game design, and sonification". It sounds like a fantastic conference! The festival is actually a group of events: File Machinima, File Documenta, File Media Art, File Hypersonica, File Games, File Symposium, File Prix Lux, and workshops.

Christian Zoellner's Links:

(I just noticed I'm on this list of links.)

RELATED

FILE SAO PAULO 2010: July 27-August 29

"This year, besides the Centro Cultural FIESP - Ruth Cardoso programme, FILE launches FILE PAI (Paulista Avenue Interactive = Interactive Public Art), a project of digital public art that will occupy several spaces at Paulista Avenue with interactive works of art.

0 - Interactive Projection, 1 - Brigadeiro subway station, 2 - Electronic sound bus, 3 - Nomadic electronic graffiti, 4 - Paraíso subway station, 5 - Fnac store, 6 - FIESP Cultural Center - Ruth Cardoso, 7 - Trianon-Masp subway station, 8 - Conjunto Nacional building, 9 - Consolação subway station, 10 - Cervantes Institute, and 11 - São Paulo Art Museum - MASP compose the FILE PAI set, which intends to highlight the significance of interactive public art in order to understand and to absorb the new social phenomena provided by technology and, thus, to constitute strategies to interconnect with those new mass behaviors."

SOMEWHAT RELATED
Building Music at Spark Festival 09 (opens up to a full screen video of a musical building,from Play the Magic.

Jul 25, 2010

Interactive Mirror, by Interference Inc. (Video)

Via Seth Sandler, who worked on this app for Interference Inc.

RELATED
Interactive Mirror (2008)

Interactive Mirror from Alpay Kasal on Vimeo.

Virtual Reality Effectively Treats PTSD and Related Disorders: Skip Rizzo's TEDx Talk about promising interdisciplinary work at the Institute for Creative Technologies

-Skip Rizzo, Co-Director of the VRPSYCH Lab at the USC Institute of Creative Technologies (ICT)

Note: Skip's talk begins about 4 minutes into the presentation.

In this TEDx Talk video, Marilyn Flynn, Dean of the University of Southern California's School of Social Work, introduces Skip Rizzo, a research scientist and Co-Director of the VRPSYCH Lab at the USC Institute of Creative Technologies (ICT). Skip's research has focused on the use of virtual realty and related technologies for treatment and training purposes.

In this talk, Skip provides an overview of the interdisciplinary research taking place at the Institute of Creative Technologies (ICT). Skip goes on to explain the urgency of ICT's current work, focusing on the treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other problems experienced by people who have sacrificed so much to serve our country in places of wars and conflicts such as Iraq and Afganistan. Neary one-third of our military personnel are significantly at-risk for developing PTSD or other debilitating conditions that will negatively affect their functioning upon returning home.

Skip goes on to show how the latest VR (Virtual Reality) related technologies and applications combine with with evidence-based intervention and treatment strategies to successfully treat PTSD. Recent research indicates that 75% of clients treated through 10 sessions of exposure therapy no longer exhibit clinical symptoms of the disorder. Given the numbers of people suffering from PTSD and related disorders, the potential for this treatment method holds promise.

Skip points out that one problem many veterans or their loved ones experience is that they are not aware that effective treatment is available. Additionally, there are few therapists who are trained in the use of VR as a therapeutic tool. By working with USC's School of Social Work, this may no longer be the case in the future. Therapist can learn ways to provide effective evidence-based treatment through interacting with a "virtual human" application that uses an "intelligent" character that simulates the conversational exchanges that are likely to occur during treatment sessions. Additionally, the research behind this effort has resulted in the creation of an on-line system that includes virtual guides that can provide support and guidance to people suffering from PSTD in order to get them to engage in the treatment they require.

Here is information from the Institute of Creative Technologies regarding Skip Rizzo's TEDx USC Talk:
Skip Rizzo's TEDx USC Talk Now Online
"ICT’s Skip Rizzo spoke at this year’s TEDx USC conference and was introduced by Dean Marilyn Flynn of the USC School of Social Work. Video of their talk is now available for viewing on the TEDx Talk’s Channel on YouTube...Of the more than 1.6 million men and women deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, nearly one-third are expected to return with disabling combat stress disorders that may affect some for a lifetime if left untreated.

Through and unlikely marriage of social work and cutting edge technology, the USC Institute for Creative Technologies and the USC School of Social Work are revolutionizing the training methods for a new generation of mental health professionals, shifting the way clinicians learn to interact with their patients."

Introduction: Marilyn Flynn, Dean, USC School of Social Work
Virtual Reality Demonstration: Albert “Skip” Rizzo, Research Scientist, USC Institute for Creative Technologies

RELATED
USC Institute for Creative Technologies
"The USC Institute for Creative Technologies brings together high-tech tools + classic storytelling to pioneer new ways to teach + to train."
Virtual Reality & Convergence with Game Technology IMT blogpost, 7/2006
Convergence: Video Games and Virtual Reality for Special Needs: Autism, ADD, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, Social Skills TechPsych blogpost, 8/2006
(I will revisit this and related topics in future posts.)

Online Lego Universe: "Lego tries to construct a new empire with pixels, not plastic" (David Kushner, IEEE Spectrum)

The July issue of IEEE Spectrum is full of articles for techies and the tech-curious. Although the cover article, The Chrystal That Will Change Everything" is intriguing, the article that caught my eye was Building the Lego Universe Online, by David Kushner.

Photo: Holly Lindem; LEGO Sculpture: Nathan Sawaya, in Building the Lego Universe Online, David Kushner, IEEE Spectrum, July 2010

"...unlike traditional Lego play, the online version will offer unprecedented opportunities for players to share and interact. The sprawling Lego fantasyland will be able to support more than half a million "brick heads" from around the world. Each player will start by assembling a personal Lego miniature figure to serve as his or her avatar. Players can then venture into the live Lego Universe, where forces of chaos and destruction—monsters such as the Darklings—threaten to destroy the Land of Imagination." -David Kushner

SCREENSHOT: LEGO Universe
Nathan Sawaya, the artist behind the creation in the above picture of a boy and a laptop, is known for his life-size LEGO sculptures, is one of just nine LEGO Certified Professionals.

The LEGO Universe website has media resource section that includes game screenshots, videos of game-play, pictures of concept art, wallpaper downloads, and information for the press.

Video courtesy of joystiq BETA:
LEGO Universe trailers rebuild our capacity to love. Griffen McElroy, July 23, 2010

Jul 22, 2010

Connected Youth: Theme of the July-Sept issue of IEEE Pervasive Computing

July-Sept. 2010 IEEE Pervasive Computing Cover: Connected Youth

The guest editors of the July-September 2010 issue of IEEE's Pervasive Computing magazine are John Canny, an engineering professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and Jason Hong, an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University's Human-Computer Interaction Institute. Their article provides an introduction to the publication's timely theme, Connected Youth. The editors find that the study of the current generation of children and teens provides useful information about the future of computing as in integrates more seamlessly into our daily lives, the way we learn, and our relationships and interaction with others across time, place, and generations.

I'm in the middle of reading this issue of Pervasive Computing. The articles that have caught my eye so far include "Story Time for the 21st Century", which describes the research an implementation of an interactive book-reading system designed to connect children, family members, and grandparents who live in distant locations. The system involves videoconferencing with paper books and interactive content, and enables grandparents to read with their grandchildren via the Internet.

Additional information about Story Play, a system that is still under development, can be found on the Nokia Research Center website: "Family Story Play: Story Time for the 21st Century". A follow-up project to Story Play is Story Visit:

I'll post more about the articles from the Connected Youth issue of Pervasive Computing in the future.

Jul 20, 2010

The Weather Channel on Microsoft Surface at WPC 2010

Below is a video of a demonstration of the Weather Channel application for Microsoft Surface:

The Weather Channel on Microsoft Surface
Eric Havir, MSDN Blog, 7/19/2010

The Weather Channel