Authoring Mixed Reality–A Component and Framework-Based Approach

While Mixed Reality (MR) technology is steadily maturing, application development is still lacking advanced authoring tools -even the simple presentation of information, which should not require any programming, is not systematically addressed by development tools. Moreover, there is also a severe lack of agreed techniques or best practices for the structuring of MR content. In this paper we present APRIL, the Augmented Presentation and Interaction Languge, an authoring platform for MR presentations which provides tools and techniques that are independent of specific applications or target hardware platforms, and should be suitable to raise the level of abstraction on which MR content creators can operate.

2005

Mixed Reality (MR) offers a unique challenge in integrating interacting agents, show-control devices, graphics and audio presentation, and human interaction into a single consolidated system. While each component may be addressed individually, combining their various functionalities via a dynamic script that delivers an interactive, non-linear story (scenario, world) requires a robust process and system. In this paper, we present a

Proceedings of the International Workshop on …, 2001

This paper describes a program of research to develop and implement an integrated system of data collection and authoring tools and a concomitant infrastructure for collecting and presenting a range of information about a specific location in a Mixed Reality experience. The system has been designed so that a wide range of users such as scientific domain experts, artists, or any user with a mobile phone, can author and "post" information to a particular site.

2004

Abstract This chapter introduces a component-oriented approach for developing mixed reality (MR) applications. After a short definition of mixed reality, we present two possible solutions for a component-oriented framework. Both solutions have been implemented in two different MR projects (SAVE and AMIRE). The first project, SAVE, is a safety training system for virtual environments, whereas the goal of the AMIRE project is to develop different authoring tools for mixed reality applications.

2002

Abstract Mixed Reality, the simultaneous overlay of the real world with a computer-generated world, has a special potential for solving authoring problems. Since the world to be modeled and the actual computer model can be visualized together, it is possible to show their relationship in a less abstract form. This could be very valuable for authoring purposes, since authors are often concerned with building a model of certain aspects of reality. A prominent role in the authoring process is assumed by authoring tools.

2003

This paper describes a software platform oriented to the augmented reality/mixed reality application developer, aiming at simplifying his/her programming tasks. This platform comprises a software development kit (SDK) for the Windows environment, consisting of a set of C++ classes packaged into modules. The platform is known as MX toolkit and utilises extensively the AR toolkit, for all matters regarding marker-based tracking, but is defined at a somewhat higher abstraction level than the AR toolkit software layer, by hiding from the programmer, low level implementation details and facilitating AR/MR object-oriented programming. The MX toolkit is presented by means of a comparison with the AR toolkit processing pipeline and API and by explaining its eight system modules. We expect to provide this package as an aid for AR toolkit-based applications development. The paper also describes a visual AR/MR authoring tool, the Mix It application, from the user interface point of view, as an illustration of the development support potential of the MX toolkit SDK.

This chapter describes the evolution of a software system specifically designed to support the creation and delivery of Mixed Reality (MR) experiences. We first describe some of the attributes required of such a system. We then present a series of MR experiences that we have developed over the last four years, with companion sections on lessons learned and lessons applied. We conclude with several sample scripts that one might write to create experiences within the current version of this system. The authors' goals are to show the readers the unique challenges in developing an MR system for multimodal, multi-sensory experiences and to demonstrate how developing MR applications informs the evolution of such a framework.

Proceedings of the 18th …, 2006

Developing an Augmented Reality (AR) application is usually a long and non-intuitive task. Few methodologies address this problem and tools implementing these are limited or non-existent. To date there is no efficient and easy development tool tailored to the needs of Mixed Reality (MR). We are presenting an initial taxonomy of MR applications, addressing the different levels of abstraction for defining the relation between real and virtual world. We then demonstrate some development approaches and describe tools and libraries that we implemented in order to illustrate aspects of our authoring taxonomy. Finally, we provide a definition addressing the requirements for new generation of AR rapid application development (RAD) tools based on actual implementations.

Entertainment Computing, 2003

This paper describes a prototyping environment for rapid application development. We combine existing AR-technologies with a component-based 3D animation library and a scripting API. Through the development of an interface to a high-level 3D modelling system we are able to use this visual tool for modelling and basic animation features in MR design. This provides content experts with a powerful tool to quickly design and test mixed reality prototypes. We consider applications in the area of interactive mixed reality illustrations in the context of technical descriptions / user manuals and interactive exhibitions in museums.

INTERACT 2001, 2001

Mixed Reality (MR) aims to create user interfaces where interactive virtual objects are overlaid on the physical environment, naturally blending with it in real time. In this paper we presents Tiles, a MR authoring interface for easy and effective spatial composition, layout and arrangement of digital objects in mixed reality environments. Based on a tangible MR interface approach, Tiles is a transparent user interface that allows users to seamlessly interact with both virtual and physical objects. It also introduces a consistent MR interface model, providing a set of tools that allow users to dynamically add, remove, copy, duplicate and annotate virtual objects anywhere in the 3D physical workspace. Although our interaction techniques are broadly applicable, we ground them in an application for rapid prototyping and evaluation of aircraft instrument panels. We also present informal user observations and a preliminary framework for further work.