4D visit from South Korean government
07 Mar 2017 - 14:37:22 in Achievement
A representative for the South Korean government recently visited Victoria’s School of Engineering and Computer Science to observe research taking place in computer graphics.
Mr Kim Byoung-Gwan, this Prime Minister’s Fellow for Korea, viewed research which is part of a Korea/New Zealand government-funded project, HDI24D: Human-digital content interaction for immersive 4D home entertainment.
The project is a collaboration between Victoria University, the University of Canterbury and three Korean universities: Ewha Women’s University, Hongik University and Korea University.
The research is to develop techniques for novel home entertainment using mixed reality technology, to provide immersive visualisation and tangible interaction between viewers and digital content.
The New Zealand part of the project is led by Dr Taehyun Rhee, director of Victoria’s Computer Graphics Laboratory. His research focus is on perception-based rendering, specifically lighting and composition that allows seamless incorporation of computer-generated objects into live video. He is also investigating ways to reduce visual discomfort in users wearing virtual reality headsets.
Mr Kim, who has extensive commercial experience with computer graphics techniques, trialled one of Dr Rhee’s demonstrations of real and computer-generated objects. When asked which were computer-generated, he was impressed to find that he was unable to tell the difference.
Computer Graphics Programme Director, Professor Neil Dodgson says, “Dr Rhee’s research is at the cutting edge of computer graphics. Even with the power of modern graphics cards, it is stunningly difficult to get virtual objects embedded in video, in real time, with correct lighting and shading.
“This project exemplifies the sort of international research collaboration that Victoria is so good at. We were delighted to have Mr Kim visit and to have his input on the ongoing work of our collaborative project. We look forward to future successful work in this area between Korea and New Zealand.”