Virtual World Concept Design

PDF file of Concept Proposal

Title

Mobile Augmented Reality

The Big Idea

Augmented world within your smartphone

Target Member

Ranging from people of ages 13-44, this virtual world will focus on the capabilities of the consumer's mobile phone and GPS features as the outside environment will be fully utilized.

Value Proposition

My target member audience is interested in interaction with virtual objects and creation of "games or events" that other users can modify or create from their surroundings or in an open enviroment within certain spaces (e.g. level creation). Examples of this concept include LittleBigPlanet, ModNation Racers, etc.

World Design Feature Categories

a. Self - The user will be able to explore and interact with virtual objects not seen in physical space with the mediation of the smartphone camera.

b. Place - What's unique about this virtual world is that it can be brought anywhere from your mobile phone. The limitations of where objects can be interacted are limited to non-government or business spaces.

c.Purpose - It's purpose is to create an augmented world that people can interact with augmented objects or place virtual objects for aesthetics purposes, to make a statement, etc.

d.Fun Things To Do - Interaction will be an important factor in how the augmented world will be played. Level design within actual spaces will be an important factor in terms of how the world be interpreted and seen by the players/users. As I said before, concept of level designing comes from custom creation design from LittleBigPlanet, The Incredible Machine, ModNation Racers, Crazy Machines, etc.

From Crazy Machines

One example of creating and designing within an augmented space, with the right tools and object, one can replicate a level from Quake, a PC first person shooter game:

e.Society - Rules are very strict in terms of where one can place these virtual objects, design augmented spaces due to certain business and locations being restricted to the public, and the monopoly of owning certain locations is prohibited, which the creator of the designs will pay a fine if they do not remove their virtual objects in a certain amount of days.

World Design Plan

As said, world will be augmented within mobile devices, which all phones are required to as well as makes use of the following:

-Built-in camera

-Compass

-GPS

-Accelerometer

Interface Components

One example of how the interface would look like when interacting with other players who may be plugged in the virtual world or has the app installed in their smartphone. Trying to deviate away from the intention of the video's purpose to show augmented dating, the idea I am trying to visualize is that people who have a smartphone that has the app installed can be automatically detected, with a quick profile about the user.

In this video, the person interacting with the object is manipulating an object with the use of his special designed glove which has a special barcode that the HUD display detects, which if the virtual object is also touched, the object can be manipulated.

Interaction between the virtual objects in terms of moving, locating, and programming will be mediated with: [from left to right] a chorded keyboard, forearm keyboard, track-ball mouse, touch-pad mouse, and gyroscopic mouse.

An example of how users can implement their objects is a geo-based augmented reality content platform, which publishes your content within augmented reality, but not limited to Layar, Junaio, and Wikitude.

Out-World Components

An official forum can be created to share ideas, programming codes to make objects do certain things, as well as to create community and so on. Social networking is usually done via Facebook, Twitter, email notifications, etc.

Research

Links

Dr. Wayne Piekarski PhD Thesis - http://www.tinmith.net/wayne/thesis/

Second Life Forums - http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Forums/ct-p/Forums

Hoppala - http://www.hoppala-agency.com/

Layar - http://www.layar.com/

Videos

FLARToolKit and Flash dynamic audio. from Wouter Hisschemöller on Vimeo.

Notes, Research, etc. for Final

A lot of my classmates from my Locative Studio class in Conceptual Information Art (CIA) have been researching locative media/gaming/etc. to augmented reality.

A classmate named Lucas is working on a smartphone app which he is making an MMORPG first person shooter: Lord of Locnar

Another is focusing on sound and augmented reality with the help of Layar and Hoopala, a starting platform for augmented reality. He has a couple of videos posted on his blog, which caught my attention because essentially, this is the visual idea I had in mind.

FLARToolKit and Flash dynamic audio. from Wouter Hisschemöller on Vimeo.

Konstruct from James Alliban on Vimeo.

Wayne Piekarski

http://www.tinmith.net/wayne/

PhD Thesis

AR Virtual Pool

The Art of Nothing (Google Docs)

Second Life Event Documentation and Videos

These set of videos were all captured via FRAPS.

Feedback of one participant:

1. The overall Scenario:

Overall, the event was pretty fun. The guns and the ghost were fun additions to the maze. However, if you found your way through the maze too quickly, you were left in a pit of ghosts with nothing to do.

2. The Experiment Mechanics:

The guns and the ghost gave the event something to do, aside from finding your way through the maze. The moving panels of the maze also made things more interesting. I also liked the dark rooms in between the layers of the maze.

3. The Experiment Roles:

Everyone who participated were both explorers and documenters. It would have been nice if we were told to document at the beginning. I ended up going back into the maze to get more screenshots because I was already out of the maze when it was announced that we should take screenshots.

4. What worked:

The way the maze was constructed and the overall fun of the event.

5. What did not work:

It seemed like there were issues with the ghosts multiplying.

6. Anything else to add:

The dark rooms could have been made more mazelike too, instead of a simple linear path. It could have been an interesting blind maze kind of thing.

Idea(s) for Final Proposal

Augmented Reality within the Real World

One of my ideas of extrapolating the virtual world within the confines of our own space is through augmented reality. Technology has brought improvements in aspects of our lives, although some may dispute that other areas can be improved or are pushing us down.

Instead of having users augment their reality with the help of technology they would need to use in order to see the virtual display (e.g. camera, virtual reality glasses), physical spaces will display the synthetic environment that will invade the real world, without disrupting nature, but rather people's interfaces of what we view in the world.

Users will have their own identity cards/RFID chips internally inside them to interact/move the virtual objects.

Ghost Hunting Event

Okay guys, hopefully you guys will be prepared for tomorrow's event. Here some rules that will be followed when going in the maze:

1. Everyone will be provided with a gun box on arrival.
2. Everyone is free to select a gun to wear and follow instructions for that specific gun which is stated in local chat.
3. Wear the gun and go into Mouselook to use the gun (press esc, then m)
4. Once in Mouselook mode, click your mouse to shoot and move the mouse and arrow keys to control your avatar.
5. Please, do not fly or jump when in Mouselook mode.
6. Now you're all set to go through the maze.

Please click here to go to the location where the maze is located.

Here's our survey when you're done with our maze:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/JJDMCYJ

Experimental Plan Notes

1. Experiment Title: Zombie Tag (?). It's a zombie game where the whole class can participate and get involved and interact. This event will make the 1 hour event time pass by quick and fast.
2. Experiment Scenario: The basic focus of the experiment is to create a game that people can interact with by shooting zombies hidden in a maze contained in one giant building.
3. The Experiment Mechanics: Everyone will enter a maze that contains zombies hidden within but the location of each will be unknown. The maze will be contained in one giant building and the challenge is to complete the goal that will be assigned on arrival. Everyone will have to stay alert at all times on look out for zombies as they try to find a way to complete the goal. For defense, people are armed with a gun that can defeat the zombie eventually.
4. SL Location: Sandbox
5. Roles: There will be 2 teams in this game: the zombie team and the human team. The roles will be divided in class and our group members will lead each team. Both teams will be wearing a health meter that decreases when damaged. No one is guaranteed to walk out alive.
6. Role Assignments:
Mari- scripting zombie
Jessie- clothing
Michael Yra- GPS system/maze
Michael Nardo- scripting/maze
Our roles are flexible because we help each other out.
The class will be able to participate in the game since the goal is to defeat zombies.
7. Assets Provided:
There will be a box containing all items (gun, outfit, health meter) before entering the maze.
8. Participant preparation: An outfit will be provided on arrival and everything will be contained inside a box that everyone will have access to.


****Later on I will be covering***
9. FEEDBACK SURVEY - LINK TO SURVEYMONKEY FEEDBACK SURVEY
Every Experiment's feedback SurveyMonkey Survey BOTH in the experiment (in the form of a self-identifying, scripted object) AND linked from their experiment PLAN post on their blog.

10. STANDARD DETAIL FEEDBACK FORMS - will be distributed by Jane. You will gather, digest, include in report.

11. PRODUCTION PLAN - DESCRIBE IN A SHORT PARAGRAPH
We want to get as much experiential information as possible while expending the least amount of effort in production. Research SL locations and assets to see if there are already existing resources you can use. Streamline the design of everything you create, delete unnecessary and potentially distracting details. This is not a game graphics or programming course - just designing and coordinating the activities well will take effort.

12. EXPERIMENT REVIEW REPORT/PRESENTATION
You will post a review report on your experiment that includes documentation gathered, survey feedback, and observational information. This will be posted on your blog(s) and form the core of a presentation to the class for discussion.

My Interests in DAI 627 (or exploring new possibilities in Second Life)

Seeing that I'm the only fine arts student in the virtual worlds design class, what I'm looking towards my interests in creating something unique/different in virtual worlds is to create a new form of media, whether it be big, small, or something of a deviation to a previous medium or form of technology, it doesn't matter as long as it's a fresh idea.

Currently, my interests is towards location-based media, since I'm taking an art class that focuses on the art and theory of locative media. [1] Like this class, it's a studio-based class where students explore the tools and impact of this emerging medium, where students can bring in and share ideas, including their creative endeavors. Compared to the virtual worlds class here, the curriculum is more structured and rigid, where our work seems to be the focus on one particular tool.

When I heard about this class at first from the late Steve Wilson, former head of the Conceptual Information Arts program, he suggested that since I was interested in exploring digital media or video games, I was suggested to take this class, but then took a shot at making CIA my area of study, since they too focused on the theory of new media.

As time passed by, my interests have started to changed dramatically, due to my student and personal life, I felt that I didn't need to focus on projects or create art that would likely loot myself the "big bucks" or a job with good pay (maybe something that'll keep me financially stable).

I guess my interests in exploring virtual worlds seems a bit vague here, but one of my goals of getting something out of this class is not to just play around Second Life and do nothing other than that for the whole semester (which is what I've honestly been doing lately, but throwing ideas has been helping me lately [2]). I want to create a fantastic work of art that I can be proud of that is in the realm of non-tangible space rather than an art gallery, for example.

References:

[1] - http://supermodule64.blogspot.com/

[2] - http://community.secondlife.com/t5/General-Discussion-Forum/Locative-Media-in-Second-Life/td-p/1157459