SIGGRAPH 2013 E-Tech | Mobile: Arabic ACM SIGGRAPH International Resources

AGATHE's objective is to provide therapists with an innovative means of dealing with cognitive rehabilitation and to offer patients customized rehabilitation sessions that simulate activities of daily living.

Interactions with computers have expanded into the physical world. Recent developments of low-cost gesture-tracking technologies, like the Microsoft Kinect, have enabled millions of users to interact with their computers by gesturing with their bodies. Furthermore, computer-vision tracking and registration techniques now enable novel projection-based displays to overlay projected images into our physical environments, creating entirely new augmented-reality experiences. These natural interfaces will continue to be incorporated into mobile devices, where they will enable rich interactive experiences anywhere, anytime.

AquaTop Display is a projection system that uses white water as a screen surface. By using a depth camera to detect fingers on and over the water surface, the system allows users to interact with projected images by gestures such as protruding fingers out from under the water surface and scooping up the water with both hands. When users "float" on the water surface, they can fuse their bodies with the displayed objects for further augmented interaction by "becoming one" with the screen. These types of interactions are not possible with current impenetrable, rigid-body, flat surfaces.

Interactions with computers have expanded into the physical world. Recent developments of low-cost gesture-tracking technologies, like the Microsoft Kinect, have enabled millions of users to interact with their computers by gesturing with their bodies. Furthermore, computer-vision tracking and registration techniques now enable novel projection-based displays to overlay projected images into our physical environments, creating entirely new augmented-reality experiences. These natural interfaces will continue to be incorporated into mobile devices, where they will enable rich interactive experiences anywhere, anytime.

Psychophysical studies from as far back as the mid-1800s document a curious fact about human vision: while in our minds we perceive the world clearly all around us, at any given moment we only see sharply within a few degrees of the direction we're looking. That tiny foveal region is roughly the size of your thumbnail with your arm fully extended. In spite of this known phenomenon, computer graphics systems have traditionally rendered the entire screen at uniform resolution. This is extremely wasteful of rendering resources in the periphery, where the higher resolution is not even perceptible. It also results in lower quality where the user is directly looking, because there are fewer resources left for rendering there. This system demonstrates that by concentrating rendering resources at the viewer's gaze position, and by carefully lowering the resolution in the periphery, higher quality can be achieved with an order-of-magnitude reduction in rendering costs. With the emergence of commodity eye-tracking technology, foveated rendering can enable more detailed display, at higher resolutions and larger field of view, with lighter weight, cheaper, and less power-hungry hardware.

In a user study designed to evaluate the quality of the simulated movement and its impact on the quality of the video-viewing experience, participants reported that the simulated motion was consistent with their real-world experiences, and they reported a sensation of self-motion. SIGGRAPH 2013 attendees are invited to experience four videos enhanced by haptic effects of motion: a horse ride, a rollercoaster ride, a spaceship flight, and a 4D movie.