VIRTUAL MOVEMENT
UTD Mercury Jan 31 2005

UTD's latest chunk of high-tech hardware will enable researchers in the Human Resource Annex (HRA) to record the motion of objects and translate them into three-dimensional animations.

The arrival of the $350,000 Motion Capture and Virtual Reality lab was made possible with the collaboration of the School of Arts and Humanities (A&H) and the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science (ECS). Funding for the 1,435 sq. ft. lab came from the $300 million made available to UTD by "Project-Emmitt" – the economic development agreement between the State of Texas, Texas Instruments and UT System.

Research conducted in the lab will facilitate the study of human movements, which could lead to advances in many fields including entertainment, athletic training, education, biomedicine and video game animations.

To record the motion of a dancer, for example, numerous reflectors would be placed at the key joint positions of the dancer in a blue-walled performance area will record the movement from reflected signals.

"It's not just a high-quality laboratory that has to focus in a particular direction; it really is a resource for studying human performance," said Thomas Linehan, A&H professor and co-director of the Institute for Interactive Arts and Engineering.

Dean of ECS, Robert Helms, said that the lab will provide a unique opportunity to combine engineering and computer science with arts.

"The Arts & Humanities department understands human motions, for example, in the dancers," Helms said. "We will use their aspect of motion and represent it. Computer and mathematical scientists are very capable of analyzing such complicated motions, preparing a model for the body and translating the model in terms of motions that can be kept by the computer."

Helms encouraged students to use the facility to its fullest.

"This facility will provide an opportunity to the UTD students to either get completely involved in an intense fashion or at least know what it looks like when the arts faculty and computer science faculty work together in the same room," Helms said.

The facility should be of particular use to the students in the arts & technology program.

"It will significantly help the arts & technology students to improve the quality of animations that they produce, because very few schools have this kind of a lab where they can record motion and use it to drive their animated characters," Linehan said. "Our program will really advance."

The applications of the facility are in various areas like:
• Animated gaming - the figures will look more realistic than mere cartoons.
• Military - includes technical training and defense techniques.
• Medical - includes biomedical research, biomechanics, understanding gait and measuring human performance under different conditions of stress and aging.
• Engineering - includes making automobiles to suit over-weight and aged based on their movement abilities.
• Athletics - includes training of athletes based on the recorded movements of expert athletes.

Pooja Ghatalia | Mercury Contributor

About IIAE
UTD’s Institute for Interactive Arts and Engineering was established to provide students with an opportunity to learn about interactive advancements in the fields of communication, entertainment, digital arts, education and training, as well as in scientific and medical applications. As part of their studies, students, along with faculty, are charged with inventing new pathways for the converging disciplines and fields. The institute is a collaborative, interdisciplinary effort by two of UTD’s seven schools — the School of Arts and Humanities and the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science.

About UTD
The University of Texas at Dallas, located at the convergence of Richardson, Plano and Dallas in the heart of the complex of major multinational technology corporations known as the Telecom Corridor®, enrolls more than 14,000 students. The school’s freshman class traditionally stands at the forefront of Texas state universities in terms of average SAT scores. The university offers a broad assortment of bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degree programs. For additional information about UTD, please visit the university’s web site at www.utdallas.edu.