The Human Effect of Tech: SIGGRAPH 2019 Shines Light on Adaptive Technology

From Research Innovations to Interactive Installations, Conference Showcases How Tech Is Helping Humans

CHICAGO—SIGGRAPH 2019 announces programming focused around Adaptive Technology, a new focus area for its upcoming Los Angeles conference. Participants can discover the latest innovations with the potential to help humans of the future adapt during the 28 July–1 August event at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

As existing technologies continue to expand and enhance capabilities, so, too, does the SIGGRAPH conference. Accessibility is an integral part of the exciting, inclusive future SIGGRAPH helps facilitate and this year’s organizers are thrilled to showcase — through the all-new Adaptive Technology focus area — how virtual and augmented reality, as well as other new technologies, are shaping possibilities of the future and enhancing lives.

“While this may be the first year of SIGGRAPH’s Adaptive Technology focus area, the conference is no stranger to showcasing content with adaptive implications,” said SIGGRAPH 2019 Adaptive Technology Co-chair Natalie Rountree. “It has been a pleasure to work alongside my fellow SIGGRAPH 2019 committee chairs to elevate these important innovations. For those seeking some history, Dylan, my co-chair, and I have also created an interactive touchscreen for the Experience Hall that will offer a peek into past adaptive tech at SIGGRAPH.”

From VR to 3D, incredible technological advancements are happening every day, offering new ways for technology to assist humans. Organizers of this year’s conference encouraged and accepted submitted content with an emphasis on adaptive technology across many of its storied programs, including Art Papers, Courses, Emerging Technologies, Immersive Pavilion, Panels, Posters, Studio, and Talks.

Adds SIGGRAPH 2019 Conference Chair Mikki Rose, “Our amazing SIGGRAPH community continues to create a foundation for new ways in which computer graphics and interactive techniques can help alternatively abled people in their day-to-day lives. I am so proud to shine a light on the potential applications of the future through this new focus area.”

Adaptive technology highlights at SIGGRAPH 2019 include:

ART PAPERS

Air Hugs: A Large-Scale Interactive Installation

Author: Rachel Dickey, University of North Carolina Charlotte

The Air Hugs project is a large-scale interactive installation that transforms the space around the passerby using actuated inflatables and computer vision. The title of the installation draws from the hug as a discursive tool for describing variable space which is modified by the circulation of the public.

EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES

Matching Visual Acuity and Prescription: Towards AR for Humans

Contributors: Jonghyun Kim, Michael Stengel, Ben Boudaoud, Josef Spjut, Kaan Akşit, David Luebke, Rachel Albert, Trey Greer, Ward Lopes, Zander Majercik, and Peter Shirley, NVIDIA; Jui-Yi Wu, NVIDIA and National Chiao Tung University; Morgan McGuire, NVIDIA and University of Waterloo; and, Youngmo Jeong, NVIDIA and Seoul National University

Inspired by human visual perception, we demonstrate two novel wearable augmented reality displays. The first, “Prescription AR,” integrates prescription correction in a 5 millimeter-thick image combiner. The second, “Foveated AR,” adapts to user gaze by adjusting the resolution and focal depth.

IMMERSIVE PAVILION [Village]

Autism XR

Contributors: Marc Petz, Mary Musto, Laura Robinson, and Keith Takens, Kent Career Tech Center

Students with ASD often struggle with social communication and behaviors. Autism XR provides a safe, web-based augmented reality (WebXR) environment that allows the user to privately practice their social skills and behaviors on a mobile device.

POSTERS

Rapid 3D Building Modeling by Sketching

Contributors: Chia-Yu Chen and I-Chen Lin, National Chiao Tung University

This poster proposes an intuitive tool for creating 3D architectural models, where a user only needs to sketch the outline of a frontal or oblique view of a building.

TALKS

Adaptive Environments with PARALLEL REALITY™ Displays

Speakers: Matt Lathrop and Paul H. Dietz, Misapplied Sciences, Inc.

PARALLEL REALITY displays are a new type of shared display that can simultaneously target personalized content to each viewer — without special glasses. These displays can be used to adapt signage in an environment to accommodate each individual’s needs, such as what language they speak or their visual acuity.

ACM SIGGRAPH DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION SUMMIT

Panel: Inclusion of Diverse Talent With Outstanding Abilities

Panelists: Brianna Blaser, DO-IT, University of Washington; Robert Parke, University of Southern California; Jeffrey Shapiro, Exceptional Minds; David Miles, Exceptional Minds and Unicorn Island Productions; Avi Thomas, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; Alex Bryant, Angelo State University (moderator)

There is great diversity in the inclusion of individuals with outstanding abilities. There are individuals in our society who are blind, low-vision, deaf, hard of hearing, mobility disabled, or cognitively disabled in our classrooms, companies, and research labs that are a talent resource to our organizations. Discover how organizations are building, expanding, and sustaining programs for this demographic.

Access to Adaptive Technology focus area programming is open to most SIGGRAPH 2019 badge levels. Register to discover what’s next at SIGGRAPH 2019, the 46th international conference and exhibition on computer graphics and interactive techniques: s2019.SIGGRAPH.org/register.

Source: Siggraph