Congratulations to Adeola Fabola, who successfully defended his thesis today. He is pictured with supervisor Dr Alan Millar, Internal examiner Dr Colin Allison and external examiner Dr Elizabeth Falconer, from Bournemouth University.
open virtual worlds
Immersive Learning Keynote: Dr Alan Miller
Dr Alan Miller joined other virtual reality educationalists to give an invited keynote talk at the 3rd Immersive Learning Network Conference on Tuesday 27th June.
The presentation drew upon two major complementary themes: virtual time travel and the use of immersive technologies for museums.
Finalists in VisitScotland digital competition
Congratulations to the Open Virtual Worlds Group on reaching the final of a digital competition launched by VisitScotland, Scotland’s national tourism organisation. They presented their final product idea ‘Taste From Afar’ a collection of immersive tours, to a panel of judges in the final stages.
Daily Record & Bòrd na Gàidhlig Scottish Gaelic Award for Virtual St Kilda
Congratulations to The Open Virtual Worlds group and Virtual St Kilda, which won the Gaelic as an Economic Asset Award at the Daily Record & Bòrd na Gàidhlig Scottish Gaelic Awards 2015. Dr Iain Oliver (left, from Open Virtual Worlds) and Norman MacLeod (middle) are pictured receiving the award on Wednesday evening.
Scottish Gaelic Awards: Virtual St Kilda
The virtual reconstruction of St Kilda developed by the Open Virtual Worlds Group, has reached the finals of Scottish Gaelic Awards in the category Gaelic as an Economic Asset. The awards highlight aspects of Gaelic culture, education and language showcasing excellent work undertaken to maintain cultural heritage. The event taking place in November will embrace a variety of traditional and virtual entertainments.The Awards will be presented at a high-quality dinner in St Andrew’s in the Square, Glasgow on November 18th. Good luck to all involved in the virtual reconstruction and museum installation.
![1526424_787674084578553_330837344778465729_n[1]](http://blogs.cs.st-andrews.ac.uk/csblog/files/2015/10/1526424_787674084578553_330837344778465729_n1.jpg)
PhD Viva Success: C. J. Davies
Congratulations to CJ Davies, who successfully defended his thesis today. CJ is pictured below with supervisor Dr Alan Miller and Dr Luke Hutton. Dr Ishbel Duncan acted as internal examiner and external examiner was Prof. Vic Callaghan from the University of Essex.
Virtual Worlds Research: NuiLib & Armadilo
Exciting update on two pieces of software from the Open Virtual Worlds research group.
The first is NuiLib
(available at NuiLib.org), a utility library for facilitating
development with NUI (Natural User Input) devices (such as the Microsoft
Kinect).
It puts an abstraction layer over the top of the NUI device to
hide the gory details of the original API and allows the developer to
focus on what they are trying to use the device for. It aims to ease
cross platform support, support for different devices, development and
experimentation with new NUI input parsing algorithms, integration of
new algirithms and code clarity.
The second is Armadillo.
This is a Virtual World client modified to support Kinect input. Users
can perform gestures to move their avatar through the world without having to interact with the computer itself. Helpful in museum or school installation
projects.
A video of Armadillo in action is available on the Open Virtual Worlds’ facebook timeline.
Kinect integration in Armadillo was achieved solely using NuiLib.
NuiLib has been featured on Microsoft’s Channel9 Coding for Fun blog
and by the DevelopKinect
community.
Talks are underway to include Armadillo in an
educational pilot program across 38 schools in Ireland and as part of a
Virtual World performance art project.
Both projects were developed by John McCaffery. You can find him in Room 0.09 (Jack Cole Building).
If you are starting on a Kinect project and want
to look at NuiLib or would like to superman your way through the Open
Virtual Worlds group’s reconstruction
of St Andrews Cathedral send him an email or pop in for a chat.