Sandy's Journal

Syllabus Leaning Goals

before after

----  ----

  1  |   3  | Goal 1:  articulate VR visualization software tool 

goals, requirements, and capabilities

  3  |   5  | Goal 2:  construct meaningful evaluation strategies 

for software libraries, frameworks, and applications; strategies include surveys, interviews, comparative use, case studies, and web research;

  3  |   4  | Goal 3: execute tool evaluation strategies

  2  |   3  | Goal 4: build visualization software packages

 1  |   5  | Goal 5: comparatively analyze software tools based 

on evaluation

  1  |   5  | Goal 6: be familiar with a number of VR software tools and hardware

5  |   5  | Goal 7: think critically about software

  5  |   5  | Goal 8: communicate ideas more clearly

1  |   5  | Goal 9: created a project that contributes to an 

existing wiki that serves as the central point of research and review for a certain area of computer science.

PROPOSALS

Project 1 Proposal <ADD LINK>

Presentation for Project 1 Proposal <ADD LINK>

End Presentation for Project 1 <ADD LINK>

Project 2 Proposal <ADD LINK>

Presentation for Project 2 Proposal <ADD LINK>

Poster <ADD LINK>

In-class Activity <ADD LINK>

Public Demo <ADD LINK>

ALL OTHER WIKI CONTRIBUTIONS

CONTRIBUTION 1 [short description] <ADD LINK>

CONTRIBUTION 2 [short description] <ADD LINK>

.....

CONTRIBUTION N [short description] <ADD LINK>

Hours Journal

1/29/23 -  4.5 Hours 

Reading through website & completing housekeeping tasks: 2 hours; Reading about VR research and Kenny Gruchalla: 1 hour; Playing around with TinkerCAD: 1.5 hours

• 10 minutes changes:

  • Organize the sidebar to make the wiki more navigable. For example, create a "VR Software" option and then have the existing  options, such as "VR Visualization Software", "VR Development Software", and "VR Modeling Software", be dropdowns. More through clean up efforts can go in the 1 hour or 10 hour sections. 

  • The "Scientific Data" page is challenging to navigate. It can be improved by writing a brief decription of how the data is organized so the visitor knows what to expect

  • The "VR in Pop Culture" page was lacking visual representation and since this is the pop culture section, images would really strengthen the content being presented. I added images of deepfakes and or AR and climate change so that it becomes more appealing to the eye. DONE

• Three changes should each require ~1 hour to complete.

  • Add descriptions to the images in the "3D Graphing (GeoGebra3D)" so that the viewer knows what the shapes or tools the image is suppose to convey. I would also incorporate the structure seen on the "The Performing Arts" page so that its easier to navigate.

  • I really liked the 'Related Research/News' section at the end of the "VR for Manuscriptures" page. I think that this is a great idea and want to make it it's own section in the side bar. I would take the hour to populate it, and then maintain it throughout the semester.

  • The structure of the of the "VR Modeling Software" section, observed in the "Tinker CAD" page with the description, metrics, and so forth. I would replicate this structure over in the "VR Hardware" section.

• The final three changes should each require ~10 hours to complete.

  • Developing a method of organization (how to balance links and descriptions so the wiki is informative and easy to browse) and throughly going through the "Scientific Data"  page to organize it and continue to build on to it so that there is sufficient amounts of data under each main area. This also includes cleaning up the hyperlinks, as some of the just say "data" and others have a more descriptive title. 

  • When you click on the "Student Research" option, the page is blank. I would build this page out either with additional research, or a more digestable version/overview of the student research pages that are linked under the option so that people visiting this page can get a brief introduction of the work students have done so then they can decide to go read about the details in the linked pages

  • I was super intrigued by the "Medical Imaging File Formats" page and really liked that the contributor included a sources section at the end of the page, but was disappointed when the link was a 404 page. My proposed change included two parts: include a source section at the end of each page so that people have other avenues to continue their VR reach through. Then, go through each page and check that each link comes from a reputable source and that it is still live. 

2/1/23 -  4 Hours

I visited and learned from the following past projects: Robert Koch’s WebVR Mapping Project, Paul Molnar Underwater 3D Cave Exploration Project, closer look at Visualizing Mars Data in OpenSpace, and Amanda Levy's Project 2

Interesting software: Paraview, A-Frame, TinkerCAD, VisIt, and Abode Photoshop 3D 

3 Project Ideas:

Visualizing happiness in countries: Displaying per capita income data of various countries using TinkerCAD and potentially VisIt

Setback 1: How can I include collaboration? 

Possible Solution: Create an initial visualization of the data (could be the shape of the country). Create a version of the data with no visualization and a version of the data with visulized in TinkerCAD. Survey their impression and implement improvements to better visualize the data. 

Setback 2: How can I make this project more complex?

Possible Solution: instead of only visualize per capita income data of countries, gather more data that measures of the quality of life in countries (life expectancy, ect)

Representing the Ocean Seafloor: Visualizing the Using Paraview, A-Frame, (NASA data) to visualize the ocean seafloor (possibly trenches). 

Setback 1: How can I include collaboration? 

Possible Solution: Explore the visulization with peers.

Explorative Brown Univeristy Map: Find data on student’s favorite location on Brown Univeristy and using tools like Paraview and Abode Photoshop 3D modeling, create an environment that recreates the space for people to collaborate in; as well as include important historical information about the space to educate students on Brown’s history.  

Setback 1: How can I include data visualization? 

Possible Solution: Display data as part of the historical information displayed

Citing Shreya D'Souza’s Journal because it was was well-organinzed, concise, and helpful. 

2/3/23 - 2/6/23 - 3.5 hours

Project Idea 1) Visualizing happiness in countries: Displaying per capita income data of various countries using TinkerCAD and potentially VisIt

• list three things you will do during the project 

  • Compare the software that I’ll be using and create the visualization

  • Learning Unity to create a visualization that makes sense in VR. For example, a graph with 3-axis

  • One question that I have is if data is truly better in 2D. Although guest speaker Kenny Gruchalla had some thoughts, one of the demoed projects on the first day of class displayed data using VR in a very compelling way. I will create a page in the wiki analyzing my experience visualizing data and then review whether graph visualization in VR is worthwhile.

• list one class activity we might do for the project

  • Have students explore the data in 2D and 3D and give reviews of their experience and which they prefer.

• list potential deliverables:

  • Contributions to the wiki on TinkerCAD and VisIt.

  • Contributions to the wiki on the best way to display graphs: 2D vs 3D

  • Visualization of the graphs and a concluding statement on the data being presented

Project Idea 2) Representing the Ocean Seafloor: Visualizing the Using Paraview, A-Frame, (NASA data) to visualize the ocean seafloor (possibly trenches).

• list three things you will do during the project 

  • Building with Paraview, A-Frame, and Openspace. I will need to learn Unity to be able to work on the project. 

  • Sourcing data to display the ocean seafloor as accurately as possible. I will also look into the data available for trenches. Since trenches are relatively unexplored, I will have to go through many sources. 

  • Engage other students in the space and receive their feedback on how effective my data visualization is

• list one class activity we might do for the project

  • Collaboration: Having students collaborate in the visualization and explore the ocean sea floor. 

• list potential deliverables:

  • I would like to create a follow-along project guide on how others who are beginners to VR can begin to develop a project. This will help others feel less overwhelmed as they enter the space. 

  • The representation of the ocean floor 

Project Idea 3) Investigate Motion Sickness in applications like Google Earth VR, review the user experience, and research new applications that are aiming to eliminate Motion Sickness

• list three things you will do during the project 

  • Sampling different types of applications and gauge how accessible they are: do users experience motion sickness or not?

  • Researching tools that are aiming to eliminate motion sickness and reviewing them → contributions to the wiki for every tool I sample

  •  The final report will be a comparison of applications

• list one class activity we might do for the project

  • Application Accessibility: review how holes in the user experience can make an application inaccessible. I will find applications with little motion sickness and one with a lot of motion sickness and ask students to perform similar tasks. Oftentimes, we don’t think about accessibility, which is a problem because we are the future developers of these technologies. This activity will help us keep this in mind and explore possible solutions. 

• list potential deliverables:

  • Wiki contributions and reviews on the applications that I test

  • Wiki page on VR and Accessibility

  • Demo of how motion sickness can impact the user’s interaction with an application

Installed DinoVR, thank Jakobi for all of your help!

Read through the VR VIsualization Software tabs and also took a look at past journals!

Google Earth VR - 1 hour

I visited the Grand Canyon; Sofia, Bulgaria; the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, California!

Although Google Earth shows much more detail, Google Earth VR opens the door to various angles of understanding. For example, I've only seen photos of the Grand Canyon from the ground and was really taken aback by the Google Earth VR aerial view of the Grand Canyon. Both tools can are extremely useful and your preference will depend on whether you prefer detail or scale!

I was able to get the screen captures and recording; however, wasn't able to transfer it from my Oculus to my computer. It was too late for me to reach out to Jakobi and I was spending too much time without any success so I problem-solved on my own. My screen recording was too large so I added it to Google Drive and made it accessible to everyone. 

Link to the Screen Recording of Google Earth VR:  https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Lx3jC1yUEbjMMyBnr3_vKgyQeSUU91nr/view?usp=share_link