Institute for Creative Technologies

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The ICT Graphics Lab develops lighting techniques (involving photographic and computer-based methods) to enable Virtual Reality (VR) training simulations and their characters to look more "real." By capturing the lighting on real objects in panoramic images and then applying the images to similar computer-generated objects, the VR objects appear more real, as they contain illumination from the real world, including shadows.

In addition to lighting techniques, the Graphics Lab also works on methods to digitize light reflectance properties of objects. Different objects and sometimes different parts of the same object reflect light in many different ways: diffuse, shiny, translucent, etc. The Graphics Lab is developing ways to capture the reflective properties of an object by scanning them with a laser and analyzing the reflections to determine which parts are matte, which are shiny, and how sharp the reflection is at each point. The reflectance information obtained will further enhance the realistic feel of VR objects in a simulation.

The Graphics Lab has collaborated with Hollywood film producers and visual effects supervisors to create realistic lighting for computer graphics (CG) characters in such movies as The Matrix and SpiderMan 2. The lessons learned in these collaborations can be applied to the VR training simulations developed by ICT to give them more realistic details and thereby enhance a soldier's training experience.

Graphics Lab Site

Tags: digitize, effects, image, lighting, panorama, realistic, scanning

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