Contest Entries
Wednesday, 6 October
20:00 CEST UTC+2
Booths are located in Gathertown Room: Competition/Demo/Pitch-your-lab
Conect - An application for hybrid conferences
Lucas Secret,
Eloise Minder,
Dr. Jean-Rémy Chardonnet
Booth 86
For the IEEE ISMAR 2021 contest, we propose Conect, an application allowing natural social interactions to build next generation hybrid conferences. Our application works on a smartphone and a classical computer. A video projector is used at the real-world conference site and displays the names of remote attendees on the floor. On-site attendees can scan the projected names with the mobile app and communicate with remote attendees. This application allows natural interactions between on-site and remote attendees through video calls, a feature absent from current virtual world apps. Since it requires using everyday-life devices only, Conect is an non-intrusive application, easy to use and to deploy, focusing on improving awareness and preserving the experience of real-world conferences.
Hybrid Conference Experiences in the ARENA
Nuno Pereira,
Anthony Rowe,
Michael W Farb,
Ivan Liang,
Edward Lu,
Eric Riebling
Booth 87
We propose supporting hybrid conference experiences using the Augmented Reality Edge Network Architecture (ARENA). ARENA is a platform based on web technologies that simplifies the creation of collaborative mixed reality for standard Web Browsers (Chrome, Firefox) in VR, Headset AR/VR Browsers (Magic Leap, Hololens, Oculus Quest 2), and mobile AR (WebXR Viewer for iOS, Chrome with experimental flags for Android, and our own custom WebXR fork for iOS). We use a 3D scan of the conference venue as the backdrop environment for remote users and a model to stage various AR interactions for in-person users. Remote participants can use VR in a browser or a VR headset to navigate the scene. In-person participants can use AR headsets or mobile AR through WebXR browsers to see and hear remote users. ARENA can scale up to hundreds of users in the same scene and provides audio and video with spatial sound that can more closely capture real-world interactions.
The Owl: Immersive Telepresence Communication for Hybrid Conferences
Redouane Kachach,
Sandra Morcuende,
Diego González Morín,
Pablo Perez,
Ester Gonzalez-Sosa,
Francisco Pereira,
Alvaro Villegas
Booth 88
The Owl is an immersive telepresence communication system in which remote attendees feel teleported to a physical location where a capture/communication device is placed. During the session they can interact naturally with the people present in that location and also with the other remote participants. Remote attendees get the full immersive experience using commercial VR goggles or Android phones with cardboard-like HMDs. It is also possible to engage in the experience using Android phones or tablets without HMD; in this case the gaze in the remote scenario is controlled using the user’s fingers on the screen. Remote attendees using HMD are represented through avatars in the scene, while participants using plain phones or tablets will get their real time video captured by the device and rendered in overlayed windows. The latter can also be used to provide the local attendees (with) a real-time view of both the remote participants and their local surroundings. Client Software can be downloaded and installed by any user on standard devices.
