 Images (*jpg)
 Video Clip 1 (*mov)
Video Clip 2 (*mov)
 Source Code (*pde)
Assignment:
Select a topic you have a strong personal interest in pursuing. Pour your energy into the completing an excellent work before the end of the quarter. Take this opportunity to push yourself both conceptually and technically. Project:
Petri Buddy, presented on June 9, 2005 in the UCLA EDA, is an initial programming exploration inspired by augmented reality, mixing virtual objects with reality (Augmented Reality Research *pdf). The concept of the project revolves around an oversized petridish filled with water. With a simple webcam and projector, pathogen-like creatures are rear-projected on the petridish while the camera interprets the shadows (objects above the petridish) from the real world. This setup allows the user to interact with the program outside the computer monitor. Likewise, the Petri Buddy program uses the position of these shadows as the input. With the shadow input, the program drives the behavior, movement, and appearance (shape and color) of the creatures.
Each of the three unique creatures reacts to the shadows and to each other differently. For example, the presence of a shadow will repel one type of creature while attracting another. Petri Buddy turned out to be more of a deep educational exploration than a fully realized project. Much of the subtle interactions between the user and the program lacked immediate response. As a consequence, a more interesting relationship between the user and the program was never fully achieved. -- June 9, 2005 |
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