RENCI@UNC is working with Bryan Byerly at the UNC Law School, as well as ITS Teaching and Learning, on an interesting project involving the Social Computing Room and virtual worlds. Bryan is testing out the environment in the SCR as a venue for conducting virtual mock trials in Second Life.

Dave Borland at RENCI recently developed a prototype of a four-channel Second Life client.  This client provides a 360-degree view of a virtual world.  Combined with the 360-degree display provided by the Social Computing Room, the software allows people in the SCR to inhabit virtual spaces.  A courtroom environment was built on the UNC Second Life Island (in the virtual Wilson Library building), including the judge’s bench, the jury box, the witness stand, consul’s table, and gallery.  Experiments are underway to combine SCR technology with this virtual courtroom venue in order to provide a unique experience for the participants.

The trials are slated to occur in the Fall semester, and there’s lots of work to be done.  Here’s a picture taken at one of the first dry runs, depicting a panoramic view of the courtroom environment as viewed in the Social Computing Room (click the image for a full-size panorama).

A panoramic view of a mock trial venue in the SCR

Here are some quick snaps of going’s on today at the engagement center.  First, we had a class working on the Dome, as well as in the Social Computing Room.  Several interesting compositions using still photography and other media were shown off in the dome:

The class is also working on interactive applications using both Flash and Processing, and incorporating Wiimotes and the Wii Fit.

On another front, we’re working on a virtual courtroom on the UNC island in Second Life.  This is a prototype for potential in-world mock trials.  Here’s a picture of an avatar hanging out in the jury box:

Here’s a shot of a class using the Social Computing Room to explore virtual worlds.  Note that we’re working on (already in prototype) a 360-degree client so that the whole room can be embedded within a virtual space.  There’s a project we’re looking at that can leverage that.

Exploring SL in the Social Computing Room this week

The Social Computing Room is a unique space on the UNC Campus that features:

• A 360-degree wrap-around visualization display, with a 12,288 x 768 resolution.
• Surround-sound audio.
• Wireless mics and 360-degree camera coverage.
• UbiSense 3D location tracking for people and objects.
• An extensible architecture to support sensors, robotics, and additional projection/display equipment.
• Extensive wiring with Cat-6 to support connection of any type of peripheral electronic gear.
• Unistrut scaffolding to support physical placement of computer or audio/video gear.
• Computer closet space for installation of rack equipment and additional computing hardware.

The Social Computing Room

The Social Computing Room is ultra-flexible.  It’s really a place where you can ‘paint the walls with software’ to create many types of applications.

Since the Social Computing Room opened, we have been amazed by the wide range of applications.  Here are some broad themes that have emerged.

The SCR as a data visualization environment

Given the huge amount of visual real-estate, and the comfortable group setting, the SCR is an ideal space for groups of researchers who need to consider large amounts of data.  RENCI is developing specialized applications that allow groups to interact effortlessly with large amounts of 2D and 3D data, web information, and other tools and service while also capturing and preserving annotations and interactions.  RENCI is also looking at methods for multi-user interaction with data.

Viewing data in the SCR

The SCR as a media space

The SCR environment is a unique medium for digital humanities.  The 360-degree video environment, surround sound, as well as the extensibility and flexibility of the wiring and mechanical systems, provide a great platform for multi-media experiences.

Spectacular Justice

A great example of this is the recent Spectacular Justice installation by Joyce Rudinsky from the Communication Studies department.  Other projects include Max/MSP/Jitter productions that use the entire video environment, and interactive MIDI and musical applications that use Wiimotes and UbiSense location tracking hardware to generate MIDI music.

The SCR as a learning space

In certain cases, the SCR has been utilized as a media rich classroom.  Examples include group presentations of projects developed using different types of media, and photograpy classes.  The space is well-suited to viewing of digital photographs, GIS and map-based data, and other media.  The SCR can also be used for non-traditional and experimental class content.

The SCR as a virtual lab

The visual environment, the audio/video environment, and the ability to augment the SCR with different types of sensors and actuators, makes the SCR a promising environment for novel interactive applications.  For example, there is a prototype of a custom Second Life client for the SCR that provides a 360-degree view of the virtual world, as shown in this picture:

Four channel Second Life client in SCR

Use cases for an environment like this include mixed classes of virtual and physical attendees, lectures to classes by visiting avatars, and research into physical/virtual interaction techniques.

Other uses

There are many examples of ‘outside the box’ uses for the SCR.  These include:

• A presentation space for launching projects, or presenting to supporters of research projects.
• A ‘lab’ for experimenting with new kinds of visualization applications, and new forms of human-computer interaction.
• A ‘game’ space for elementary school visitors to the UNC campus.

The RENCI staff are willing to work with you on new ideas and applications for the Social Computing Room, as well as our other visualization environments.  Please contact us, and request a tour of our spaces.