Thompson, William B. Cohen, Elaine Utah University
Realistic Computer Graphics
This research instrumentation enables research projects in: - Locomotion Interfaces, - Virtual Prototyping, - Perception of Spatial Organization in Large-Scale Synthetic Environments, and - Realistic Computer Graphics for Natural Scenes.
The award supports the acquistion of a system for generating and projecting high quality computer graphics. The equipment supports research projects involving immersive interfaces and realistic computer graphics. Four projects are taking advantage of this resource. Improved locomotion interfaces are being developed, allowing a user to walk through a virtual environment. Work on haptic interfaces for computer aided design (CAD) is being extended, with particular attention to the integration of visual and haptic displays to better convey a sense of the complex geometries involved in most mechanical designs. Methods are being developed for more accurately conveying a sense of distance, scale, and speed in computer generated imagery. Because current techniques have great difficulty producing images of objects which appear to be far away and/or of significant size this important work may contribute to the field. Finally, an analysis of how to generate realistic looking synthetic images of outdoor scenes is being initiated. To be successful, all four of these efforts require the graphical rendering power and high resolution display capabilities being made available as part of this infrastructure acquisition.
