BodyVox – Deep Wading

BodyVox, Portland’s premier modern dance company, started their 20th anniversary season with a show called Lexicon. It was a show exploring the intersection of dance and technology. I worked with Jamey Hampton, co-founder of BodyVox, to create a dance number called “Deep Wading”. We used a 3D camera, an XBox Kinect to track the dancers. And we used a high-end graphics computer to generate graphics effects behind the dancers with the effects reacting to the dancers motion on stage.

Like many other software projects, we had a short deadline Continue reading “BodyVox – Deep Wading”

P.SYS building monitoring with WebGL

I worked with P.SYS Engineering [www.psysengineering.com] to build a concept demo of a web application to monitor a building loaded with safety sensors made by P.SYS.

A computer generated single floor of a hotel is shown. One of the rooms is highlighted in red, indicating a problem.
Click the image to launch the P.SYS building monitor demo.

In the demo you can click on parts of the building to see more detail. Click elsewhere to see less detail. A part flashing red indicates something wrong in that part of the building. Click and drag to rotate and use the mouse wheel to zoom in and out.

SchauRäume – A WebGL VR Walk-through

This project, done in conjunction with the SchauRäume project uses WebGL to do a VR walk-through of a temporary art exhibit. The SchauRäume project [www.schau.raeume.cc] is an organization that draws attention to social issues that are often considered taboo to talk about or that have been marginalized, unconsciously or otherwise. The issues are brought to light through art presented in vacant, often run down commercial properties, hence the name of the project, which translates into “show rooms”.

The image shows a screen shot of a virtual reality (VR) walk-through of an art exhibit using WebGL.[Click the image to try the demo.]

How to Use:

  • Click on Stuff to Make Things Happen. Clicking on some objects will make them do something. Clicking on some objects cause the view to fly to that object. Clicking again on the same object causes the view to take a step backwards.
  • WASD keys – Move around similar to first person shooters: W – move forward, A – move left, S – move back, D – move right.
  • Arrow keys – Change view orientation.
  • Scroll Wheel – Fly forward and backward along the direction of view.
  • View Drag and Fling: Holding down the left mouse button while dragging rotates the view orientation. Releasing the mouse button while dragging allows the rotation to coast to a stop. Doing this quickly “flings” the view orientation.

Shoreline Studios Highlights

Shoreline Studios was a startup founded near the beginning of 1995 by Tim Heidmann (CEO) and me, Wade Olsen (Principal Scientist). I was responsible for all software engineering. The video below shows highlights of Shoreline Studios: FoxTrax hockey puck tracking system, Mr. Map for CBS elections coverage, ESPN’s PrePlay for football strategy analysis, ESPN’s VRX for the Summer and Winter X-games, GolfTrack, and Rocket Pad.

Video highlights of Shoreline Studios from 1996 through 1999.
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