SIGGRAPH 2013 E-Tech | Mobile: Arabic

This light-field-based approach to near-eye display allows for dramatically thinner and lighter head-mounted displays capable of depicting accurate accommodation, convergence, and binocular-disparity depth cues. The near-eye light-field displays depict sharp images from out-of-focus display elements by synthesizing light fields that correspond to virtual scenes located within the viewer's natural accommodation range. While sharing similarities with existing integral imaging displays and microlens-based light-field cameras, the displays optimize performance in the context of near-eye viewing. Near-eye light-field displays support continuous accommodation of the eye throughout a finite depth of field; as a result, binocular configurations provide a means to address the accommodation-convergence conflict that occurs with existing stereoscopic displays. This demonstration features a binocular prototype and a GPU-accelerated stereoscopic light field renderer.

Designing animated eyes for interactive characters, robots, and toys is a challenge: they must be dynamic, fast, and highly expressive in order to represent a broad variety of character emotions and intentions. Creating eyes for fictional characters, (for example, in animated movies and cartoons) is particularly challenging, because their eye expressions are often non-realistic, highly exaggerated, and contain a much richer vocabulary of expressions than human characters. At the same time, the eye technology must be compact, fit into small characters bodies, require low power, produce no audible noise, and be robust and easily replaceable.

Skyfarer is a mixed-reality shoulder exercise game developed for prevention and treatment of shoulder pain for individuals with spinal-cord injury. The virtual environment immerses players into an adventure inspired by Pre-Colombian mythology inspired by landscapes of South America. With each exercise, players prepare, propel, and lift their vessel into water or air, collecting energy that can be used during breaks between exercise sets.

The TransWall transforms a mundane glass wall into a rich interpersonal communication medium. The concept is based on a see-through display wall that responds to touch on both sides, provides vibrotactile feedback, and dispays audio.

Sports events are exciting to watch, but simulating the haptic sensations experienced by the players would make spectating even more enjoyable. In addition to video and audio, sharing vibrotactile sensations experienced by others can provide great entertainment value at temporal and spatial distances. But existing vibrotactile devices are not efficient and convenient. They use a contact-type vibrometer to deform the original vibrations, and they are a burden to wear or carry. Even with a non-contact sensor like a microphone, it is difficult to measure slight vibrations of a fast-moving target against the surrounding noise.

WAYLA is an original game that takes advantage of the unique properties of gaze-based interaction (reflexive saccade, for example) to achieve a gaming experience that is not available with traditional input devices. In most games, players need to continuously look at and switch among multiple targets and avoid distractors. As commercial eye-tracking technology become more affordable, it is becoming one of the emerging technologies of the near future. WAYLA is at the forefront of utilizing this new technology, and it will yield many valuable insights and lessons for the next generation of game development.