Showing papers by "Blair MacIntyre published in 2013"

A psychological perspective on augmented reality in the mathematics classroom

Abstract: Physical objects and virtual information are used as teaching aids in classrooms everywhere, and until recently, merging these two worlds has been difficult at best. Augmented reality offers the combination of physical and virtual, drawing on the strengths of each. We consider this technology in the realm of the mathematics classroom, and offer theoretical underpinnings for understanding the benefits and limitations of AR learning experiences. The paper presents a framework for understanding AR learning from three perspectives: physical, cognitive, and contextual. On the physical dimension, we argue that physical manipulation affords natural interactions, thus encouraging the creation of embodied representations for educational concepts. On the cognitive dimension, we discuss how spatiotemporal alignment of information through AR experiences can aid student's symbolic understanding by scaffolding the progression of learning, resulting in improved understanding of abstract concepts. Finally, on the contextual dimension, we argue that AR creates possibilities for collaborative learning around virtual content and in non-traditional environments, ultimately facilitating personally meaningful experiences. In the process of discussing these dimensions, we discuss examples from existing AR applications and provide guidelines for future AR learning experiences, while considering the pragmatic and technological concerns facing the widespread implementation of augmented reality inside and outside the classroom.

Media studies, mobile augmented reality, and interaction design

Abstract: You are walking in the Sweetwater Creek State Park near Atlanta and using the Augmented Reality (AR) Trail Guide, a mobile application designed by Isaac Kulka for the Argon Browser (Figure 1). The application offers two views: a now familiar Google-style map, with points of interest marked on its surface, and an AR view, which shows these points located in space. You see the map view when you hold the screen parallel to the ground; when you turn the phone up to look at the world, you get the AR view with the points of interest floating in space in front of you. This simple gesture of raising the phone changes your relationship to the information. You pass from a fully symbolic form of representation to a form of perceiving symbolic information as part of your visual environment. The AR Trail Guide, developed in the Augmented Environments Lab at Georgia Tech [1], illustrates a new realm in AR design that goes beyond current commercial applications. In this article, we discuss some of these new areas, such as designing for experiences in cultural heritage, personal expression, and entertainment. At the same time, we want to address a larger issue. ACM interactions has often been a place for exploring new paradigms and the relevance for interaction design of unusual approaches from other disciplines. In that spirit, we pose the question: Can the humanistic discipline of media studies play a useful role in interaction design? Media studies looks at the history of media and their relationship to culture, and we will focus here on digital media and their relationship to other media, both present and past. Looking at digital media in a historical context is relevant because of the dynamic relationship between "traditional" media (film, television, radio, print) and their digital remediations. How can media studies be made to contribute to the productive work of interaction design? We believe one answer lies in using the historical understanding gained through media studies to develop a kind of media aesthetics that can guide designers as they explore new forms of digital media such as the mobile augmented reality application described above.

Protecting privacy in web-based immersive augmented reality

Abstract: An “AR Privacy API” provides an API that allows applications and web browsers to use various content rendering abstractions to protect user privacy in a wide range of web-based immersive augmented reality (AR) scenarios. The AR Privacy API extends the traditional concept of “web pages” to immersive “web rooms” wherein any desired combination of existing or new 2D and 3D content is rendered within a user's room or other space. Advantageously, the AR Privacy API and associated rendering abstractions are useable by a wide variety of applications and web content for enhancing the user's room or other space with web-based immersive AR content. Further, the AR Privacy API is implemented using any existing or new web page coding platform, including, but not limited to HTML, XML, CSS, JavaScript, etc., thereby enabling existing web content and coding techniques to be smoothly integrated into a wide range of web room AR scenarios.

Walled Gardens: Apps and Data as Barriers to Augmenting Reality

Abstract: For augmented reality (AR) to reach its potential, AR content from multiple distinct sources must be simultaneously displayed in a more unified manner than is possible given today's application-centric environments. AR browsers and AR-enabled Web browsers point toward the functionalities that OSs must incorporate to fully support AR content. Also, application developers need richer forms of content describing the physical world and the objects in it. Standards such as ARML (Augmented Reality Markup Language) 2.0 have begun providing the glue needed to bind AR content to the physical world.

Embodied metaphor elicitation through augmented-reality game design

Abstract: In this paper we present our experience of eliciting metaphors through the process of game design with children. For the purpose of determining a set of user interactions desired in children's augmented-reality experiences, we have conducted a study in which children used craft materials to design augmented-reality games. Game interactions and mappings between physical and virtual worlds were then analyzed to reveal metaphors in children's thinking. We describe the wide range of elicited metaphors, and argue for the use of game design as a process for metaphor elicitation.

Unified WebGL/CSS scene-graph and application to AR

Abstract: In this paper we present the implementation of a unified WebGL/CSS scene graph that allows 2D web elements to be combined with 3D WebGL-based graphics using a single scene-graph interface and discuss issues with respect to the augmented reality-enabled web browser Argon2.