SIGGRAPH 2002
Picture Page 6

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Back at the show I attended some sketches on virtual environments. Big room.

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I walked back out on the floor and this is the the sales person who took my clock and gave it to her friend yesterday. She told me that before she was in sales she actually used to be a ‘booth babe’.

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The Barco booth had some nice and big architecture up. These always look nice, I wonder if they look as good when you take it off the show floor?

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In Emerging Technologies they had a CAVE. A very nice room sized 3d display that was being controlled via an Ipaq and run from some Linux boxes. Very crisp, very nice.

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The model of the head is real, the display overlays the flesh and such. It was a very nice exhibit, very museum like in its presentation.

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The screen is a combination of a high rez LCD in the center and a lower rez projection on top. They are synchronized so you get more detail in the middle as you pan around but still retain the context of your location on the map. Very good implementation.

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A very innovative assembly, the cameras use mirrors to match what they see to the faces in the projection assembly. When you move the display assembly the camera assembly moves as well.

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A lot of talk about the Robot photographer. I hear he even does weddings.

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This was unusual. It was an AI robotic Anemone. It had built in goals, to play in the water, to drink, and to water the plants. But it would track people who walked by and get distracted. It would also avoid people who tried to touch it. After 2 minutes it went into night mode and fell asleep and other things in the environment woke up. It was very smooth.

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A haptic device that used sound with the force feedback. The use of another sense was interesting.

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A hand held ultrasound viewer. I never got to play with one before and it was neat looking inside the balloons.

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They attached a vibrating sensor to your finger and it would read the lines and give a haptic feel. I excited to try it and wasn’t thrilled with the outcome. It is a nice idea that needs a better implementation. I hope they keep working on it.

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Very bizarre. Another example of good idea that needs worked in still. It is a spinning LCD spinning matrix that uses a barrier effect to allow for 360 degree 3D display. It was too low resolution and you could see through it which was distracting. The plus was that it was autostereoscopic (no glasses). I hope they are back next year with something more advanced.

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I didn’t try the virtual sword fighting simulation but it seemed very popular.

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This used tablet computers with cameras on the back. When you pointed the camera at certain targets you could see items appear on your screen (fully rendered and matched to the scene like they were there). Nice work and I liked playing with the tablet computer.

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I’m not even sure what I was supposed to do with this. But it was big, bulky, and I didn’t like playing with it. Sorry.

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Self configuring robotics. I didn’t get the full talk on it but it looked interesting.

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The workshop lab for a class.

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On the way back on the floor they had one of those card trick guys doing a demo. He was actually funny. Wanted me to pull my card from his mouth. ick.

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Waiting on the bus and a horse and buggy went past.

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The papers reception was at a ranch 20 miles out of town. They had a dance floor and line dancing and authentic Texas BBQ.

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Then the rodeo thing happened with horses and such.

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I made jokes that after the 20 mile trip I forgot my ticket (which I didn’t) but I was told that you could actually buy a ticket (which was nice for people with dates).

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Back home a ranch means a house without a basement, here it is something a littler different. (Though I didn’t see a basement).

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Jeffery Hill said his girlfriend was going to my pages to check up on what he was doing, so now she can actually see him. He was drinking heavily and had like 2 girls on each arm. Well he did have a beer.

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I have to say that even though the show is smaller it has been a real class act. The show itself is very well organized and the people who put it together deserve a lot of credit. Well back to the show for more classes tomorrow there should only be a few more pictures.