Adrian Bullock

In this paper we describe a way of controlling the emotional states of a synthetic character in a game (FantasyA) through a tangible interface named SenToy. SenToy is a doll with sensors in the arms, legs and body, allowing the user to influence the emotions of her character in the game. The user performs gestures and movements with SenToy, which a...

In this paper we describe a way of controlling the emotional states of a synthetic character in a game (FantasyA) through a tangible interface named SenToy. SenToy is a doll with sensors in the arms, legs and body, allowing the user to influence the emotions of her character in the game. The user performs gestures and movements with SenToy, which a...

We describe the design and implementation of SenToy: a tangible doll with sensors that allows a user to influence the emotions of a synthetic character in a game. SenToy is an input device that allows the user to perform gestures or movements that the sensors inside the doll pick up. The gestures are interpreted according to a scheme found through...

Gaming is a highly relevant application area for Intelligent Agents and Human Computer Interaction (HCI). Computer games bring us a full set of new gaming experiences where synthetic characters take on the main role. Using affective input in the interaction with a game and in particular with a character is a recent and fairly unexplored dimension....

Game development is an emerging area of development for new types of interaction between computers and humans. New forms of communication are now being explored there, influenced not only by face to face communication but also by recent developments in multi-modal communication and tangible interfaces. This demo will feature a computer game, Fantas...

In this paper we describe how to control the emotional states of a synthetic character in a computer game using a tangible interface named SenToy. SenToy is a doll with sensors in its arms, legs and body, which allows the user to influence the emotional state of his controlled character by gesturing with the doll. In general, SenToy works as a new...

FantasyA is a role-playing game where emotions are part of the game logic. SenToy is a tangible interface device [2], used to influence emotional behaviour in FantasyA. Players in the game FantasyA have to master SenToy and exhibit a particular set of emotions and perform a set of actions in order to evolve in the game [3]. A study was undertaken t...

In this paper we describe a way of controlling the emotional states of a synthetic character in a game (FantasyA) through a tangible interface named SenToy. SenToy is a doll with sensors in the arms, legs and body, allowing the user to influence the emotions of her character in the game. The user performs gestures and movements with SenToy, which a...

Gaming is a highly relevant application area for Intelligent Agents and Human Computer Interaction (HCI). Computer games bring us a full set of new gaming experiences where synthetic characters take on the main role. Using affective input in the interaction with a game and in particular with a character is a recent and fairly unexplored dimension....

FantasyA is a computer game where two characters face each other in a duel and emotions are used as the driving elements in the action decision of the characters. In playing the game, the user influences the emotional state of his or her semi-autonomous avatar using a tangible interface for affective input, the SenToy. In this paper we show how we...

Room metaphors have become increasingly popular as a basis for CSCW systems. The paper describes how such metaphors might be extended to support large scale communication through the introduction of a spatial model for mediating conversations in virtual computer spaces. The model is described in terms of an abstract mathematical framework and the p...

real-world. This is particularly true where the system is to be shared between multiple users.

Security is a critical, but usually neglected, aspect of multi-user computer systems. This paper proposes the basis of an approach to access control for collaborative virtual environments.

Virtual world metaphors are becoming increasingly popular as a basis for collaborative systems. This paper describes how such metaphors might be extended to support communication on a large scale through the introduction of a spatial model for conversation management in virtual computer spaces. The key concepts of awareness, focus and aura are intr...

The combination of Virtual Reality, Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Distributed Computing Systems points towards the future development of collaborative virtual environments, large virtual worlds which support groups of people in working together. This paper introduces a spatial model of interaction which aims to provide key abstractions fo...

The paper describes the Grace project whose aim is to build distributed group communication tools within an OSI networking environment. Grace provides the foundations for a globally distributed system for cooperative working based on the notion of information sharing within activity and organisational domains.

this paper, we present the design of a poetry performance in a collaborative virtual environment (CVE) and discuss the experience of staging this performance to an audience of two hundred members of the general public.The performance took place in Nottingham on 11th November 1996 as part of the NOWninety6 arts festival and involved an extensive col...

We introduce a method for predicting the network traffic that will be generated by Collaborative Virtual Environment applications with varying numbers of participants.

This paper describes work being undertaken by the multi-partner European Union funded project COVEN (COllaborative Virtual ENvironments). COVEN is developing collaborative virtual environment (CVE) systems and technologies in order to support a group of travel rehearsal applications. One of the major themes of the project is the evaluation of CVE a...

In this paper we describe The Pond, a system used to search for and visualise data elements on an engaging tabletop display. The Pond uses methods of unencumbered interaction and audio feedback to allow users to investigate data elements, and supports shoulder-to-shoulder collaboration with the physical Pond artefact mediating the collaboration bet...

This paper describes a distributed system with the aim to allow inhabitants to re-configure arrangements of devices and to understand the behaviour of these devices in tandem by making visible the various configurations. The purpose is to address the evolutionary nature of the domestic environments. We describe two different configuration facilitie...

Collaborative virtual environments (CVEs) are a promising technology enabling re- mote participants to share a common place through three-dimensional graphical scenes. Within the COVEN project (Normand, 1999), we have run prolonged se- ries of Internet trials that have allowed us to gather valuable data to formulate us- ability guidelines and netwo...

This deliverable presents the results of the COVEN network trials that have taken place throughout 1997. These trials have involved holding a series of over thirty distributed meetings using the first version of the COVEN platform and business application (a shared VR spreadsheet) running over a dedicated ISDN network between four sites (Nottingham...

We describe our experiences of creating and using a wide variety of techniques and applications to support collaboration in virtual environments for different activities and user groups. Our aim is to offer plentiful and rich possibilities for interaction across and between both real and virtual environments. This is informed through ongoing activi...

This paper presents the results of the BT-funded `Inhabiting the Web' project which conducted a series of twenty virtual meetings using the MASSIVE virtual reality teleconferencing system between five universities and BT Laboratories. The aims of the project were, firstly, to assess the characteristics of the network traffic generated by MASSIVE an...

The article presents the design of a poetry performance in a collaborative virtual environment (CVE) and discusses the experience of staging this performance to an audience of 200 members of the general public. The performance involved an extensive collaboration among computer scientists, poets, a graphic artist, and an event production team. The a...

As CVE technology matures there is a natural shift away from simply providing places or spaces for people to meet towards providing a useful, task-oriented environment that supports its participants in whatever it is they are doing. Notably, CVEs are collaborative environments, so in order to provide appropriate environments we need to understand w...

We overview the Interactive Collaborative Environments laboratory at the Swedish Institute of Computer Science.

: COVEN (COllaborative Virtual ENvironments) is a European project that seeks to develop a comprehensive approach to the issues in the development of Collaborative Virtual Environment (CVE) technology; COVEN brings together twelve academic and industrial partners with a wide range of expertise in CSCW, networked VR, computer graphics, human factors...

We introduce a method for predicting the network traffic that will be generated by collaborative virtual environment applications with varying numbers of participants. Statistical analysis of event logs from user trials results in a user behaviour model. Controlled traffic measurements combined with an analysis of the application architecture and n...

We present an experiment that investigates the behaviour of small groups of participants in a wide-area distributed collaborative virtual environment (CVE). This is the third and largest study in a series of experiments that have examined trios of participants carrying out a highly collaborative puzzle-solving task. The results reproducing those of...

COVEN (COllaborative Virtual ENvironments) is a European project that seeks to develop a comprehensive approach to the issues in the development of Collaborative Virtual Environment (CVE) technology; COVEN brings together twelve academic and industrial partners with a wide range of expertise in CSCW, networked VR, computer graphics, human factors,...

COVEN (Collaborative Virtual Environments) is a European project that seeks to develop a comprehensive approach to the issues in the development of collaborative virtual environment (CVE) technology. COVEN brings together twelve academic and industrial partners with a wide range of expertise in CSCW, networked VR, computer graphics, human factors,...

We present an experiment that investigates the behaviour of small groups of participants in a wide-area distributed collaborative virtual environment (CVE). This is the third and largest study in a series of experiments that have examined trios of participants carrying out a highly collaborative puzzle-solving task. The results reproducing those of...

We present an experiment that investigates the behaviour of small groups of participants in a wide-area distributed collaborative virtual environment (CVE). This is the third and largest study in a series of experiments that have examined trios of participants carrying out a highly collaborative puzzle-solving task. The results reproducing those of...

this paper, we present the design of a poetry performance in a collaborative virtual environment (CVE) and discuss the experience of staging this performance to an audience of two hundred members of the general public.The performance took place in Nottingham on 11th November 1996 as part of the NOWninety6 arts festival and involved an extensive col...

A vital component of any application or environment is security, and yet this is often one of the lower priorities, losing out to performance and functionality issues, if it is considered at all. This paper considers a spatial approach to enabling, understanding and managing access control that is generally applicable across a range of collaborativ...

Abstract We present an experiment that investigates the behaviour of small groups of participants in a wide-area distributed collaborative virtual environment (CVE). This is the third and largest study in a series of experiments that have examined,trios of participants carrying out a highly collaborative puzzle-solving task. The results reproducing...

The Collaborative Virtual Environments (Coven) project, a four-year European project launched in October 1995, designs and explores collaborative virtual environment (CVE) technology. It aims to investigate the feasibility of scalable CVE worlds through developing CVE systems and demonstrating prototype applications in a virtual travel rehearsal sc...

The Collaborative Virtual Environments (Coven) project, a four-year European project launched in October 1995, designs and explores collaborative virtual environment (CVE) technology. It aims to investigate the feasibility of scalable CVE worlds through developing CVE systems and demonstrating prototype applications in a virtual travel rehearsal sc...

The Collaborative Virtual Environments (Coven) project, a four-year European project launched in October 1995, designs and explores collaborative virtual environment (CVE) technology. It aims to investigate the feasibility of scalable CVE worlds through developing CVE systems and demonstrating prototype applications in a virtual travel rehearsal sc...

This paper develops a spatial approach tom access control for virtual environments and presents an implementation in the DIVE system. Access control is governed according to the space within which subjects and objects reside and whether a subject can traverse this space in order to get close to an object. After considering why a spatial approach is...

The aims of this paper are twofold. First, it identifies the general requirements of future large-scale distributed virtual reality (VR) systems based on an analysis of current VR systems, of more general distributed systems platforms and a consideration of the key issues of scale and heterogeneity. These requirements subsequently inform the develo...

Security is always a critical issue for any software system that will be used in the real-world. This is particularly true where the system is to be shared between multiple users. This paper proposes the basis of an approach to access control for distributed collaborative virtual environments. Our approach combines two concepts; i) access control,...

Describes the Grace Project, its goals and scope. The aim of Grace is to build distributed group communications tools within an Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) networking environment. Grace provides the foundations for a globally distributed system for cooperative working based on information sharing within activity and organizational domains. I...

A system for cooperative working based on the notion of information sharing within activity and organizational domains is described. The overall functionality of the system, called Grace, is specified by an object-oriented model of information sharing which emphasizes critical issues for large scale cooperative working, including naming and organiz...

In this report we present our findings and results from the VITI program in 2000. The focus of the research work undertaken by VITI has been to provide electronic meeting environments that are easy to use and afford as natural a collaboration experience as possible. This final report is structured into three parts. Part one concerns the VITI infras...

ABSTRACT Security is a critical, but usually neglected, aspect of multi - user computer systems This paper proposes the basis of an approach to access control for collaborative virtual environments Our approach combines two concepts; i) the clearance - classification model for access control, and ii) the concept of boundaries, as defined within the...

Virtual world metaphors are becoming increasingly popular as a basis for collaborative sys- tems (i.e. Groupware and Computer Supported Cooperative Work). This paper describes how such metaphors might be extended to support communication on a large scale through the intro- duction of a spatial model for meditating interaction in virtual computer sp...