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In their opinion article, “The Ethics of Realism in Virtual and Augmented Reality,” Slater et al. (2020) raised awareness on themanifold ethical issues arising fromXR developing into a ubiquitous and daily used technology. The article of Slater et al. is true in every aspect. However, there was one further aspect missing, which will likely play a very important role when XR is no longer contained in laboratories and professional applications but a daily used technology: the ubiquitousness of drugs and their influence on perception and cognition in relation to XR.

Virtual Reality (VR) is a technology that has grown in popularity within recent years. Not only is it widely used as a gaming entertainment but now the use of the technology is increasing in other areas. VR within school is still a relatively new phenomenon. This report examines the advantages and disadvantages of VR in education and in what contexts it is appropriate to implement. To answer the report’s questions, semi-structured interviews were conducted with teachers and initiators who work with VR in Swedish schools. All respondents are working on different projects in varying age groups, this report focuses on elementary school and high school. The results show that all teachers and initiators that were interviewed are positive about the use of VR in education. The advantages are many. VR provides educational support for students with learning difficulties and disabilities; the improved memory experience is also mentioned which confirms the results of previous studies. The respondents also believe that VR is suitable for all types of lessons.

京都大学 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(エネルギー科学) / 甲第24115号 / エネ博第448号 / 新制||エネ||84(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院エネルギー科学研究科エネルギー社会・環境科学専攻 / (主査)教授 下田 宏, 教授 宇根﨑 博信, 教授 黒崎 健 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Energy Science / Kyoto University / DGAM

AR-spelet Pokémon Go har spridits i världen runt om och även gjort en stor succé sen det först lanserades sommaren 2016. Målet med spelet var att få användarna att vilja utforska världen mer, förbättra den sociala interaktionen och öka den fysiska aktiviteten. Detta leder till syftet för denna studie att studera användarnas attityder kring sociala interaktionen och fysiska aktiviteten med AR-spelet Pokémon Go. Syftet är att få en bättre förståelse kring attityderna. Denna studie utfördes med mixed methods. En kvantitativ enkätundersökning genomfördes för att först ge en överblick över användningen för Pokémon Go; totalt 62 respondenter svarade. 6 kvalitativa intervjuer med 6 utvalda respondenter från enkätundersökningen var en komplettering till den kvantitativa metoden för att få en bättre förståelse. Resultatet från det empiriska materialet i jämförelse med den tidigare forskningen visade att användarna hade en positiv syn på AR och Pokémon Go, dock fanns det användare som var skeptiska då spelet och AR enligt dem kunde kännas krävande och innebära fara. Attityden kring den sociala interaktionen och AR var både positiv och negativ då användarna ansåg att AR kan ge stöd för den sociala interaktionen, men att ett möte med främlingar kan vara riskfyllt. Resultatet visar även att majoriteten av användarna känner att AR och fysisk aktivitet är en positiv koppling då det kan vara en motivation till att vara mer fysiskt aktiv. / The AR-game Pokémon Go has spread worldwide and has also made a huge success since it first launched in the summer 2016. The goals of the game were to make the users wanting to explore the world more, improve the social interaction among them and increase the physical activity. This leads to the aim of this paper to study the users’ attitudes towards the social interaction and physical activity with the AR-game Pokémon Go. The purpose is to get a better understanding of the attitudes. This paper was conducted by using mixed method. A quantitative survey was first conducted to get an overview of the usage of Pokémon Go; 62 respondents responded it. The 6 qualitative interviews with 6 selected respondents were a supplement to the survey to get a better understanding of the attitudes. The results of the empirical material in comparison to previous research showed that the users mostly have a positive attitude towards AR and Pokémon Go, but there were users who were skeptical because according to them the game and AR could be demanding and could mean danger. The attitude towards social interaction and AR were both positive and negative because the users find that AR can support the social interaction, but a meeting with strangers can be unsafe. The results shows that the majority of the users feels that AR and physical activity is positive connection as it can be a motivation for being more physically active.

Creating physical simulations between virtual and real objects in Augmented Reality (AR) is essential for the user experience. Otherwise the user might lose sense of depth, distance and size. One of these simulations is occlusion, meaning that virtual content should be partially or fully occluded if real world objects is in the line-of-sight between the user and the content. The challenge for simulating occlusion is to construct the geometric model of the current AR environment. Earlier studies within the field have all tried to create realistic pixel-perfect occlusion and most of them have either required depth-sensing hardware or a static predefined environment. This study proposes and evaluates an alternative model-based approach to the problem. It uses geospatial data to construct the geometric model of all the buildings in the current environment, making virtual content occluded by all real buildings in the current environment. This approach made the developed function compatible with non depth-sensing devices and in a dynamic outdoor urban environment. To evaluate the solution it was implemented in a sensor-based AR application visualizing a future building in Stockholm. The effect of the developed function was that the future virtual building was occluded as expected. However, it was not pixel-perfect, meaning that the simulated occlusion was not realistic, but results from the conducted user study said that it fulfilled its goal. A majority of the participants thought that their AR experience got better with the solution activated and that their depth perception improved. However, any definite conclusions could not be drawn due to issues with the sensor-based tracking. The result from this study is interesting for the mobile AR field since the great majority of smartphones are not equipped with depth sensors. Using geospatial data for simulating occlusions, or other physical interactions between virtual and real objects, could then be an efficient enough solution until depth-sensing AR devices are more widely used. / För att uppnå en god användarupplevelse i Augmented Reality (AR) så är det viktigt att simulera fysiska interaktioner mellan de virtuella och reella objekten. Om man inte gör det kan användare uppfatta saker som djup, avstånd och storlek felaktigt. En av dessa simulationer är ocklusion som innebär att det virtuella innehållet ska vara delvis eller helt ockluderat om ett reellt objekt finns i siktlinjen mellan användaren och innehållet. För att simulera detta är utmaningen att rekonstruera den geometriska modellen av den nuvarande miljön.Tidigare studier inom fältet har försökt att uppnå en perfekt simulation av ocklusion, men majoriteten av dem har då krävt antingen djupavkännande hårdvara eller en statisk fördefinierad miljö. Denna studie föreslår och utvärderar en alternativ modellbaserad lösning på problemet. Lösningen använder geospatial data för att rekonstruera den geometriska modellen av alla byggnader i den nuvarande omgivningen, vilket resulterar i att det virtuella innehållet blir ockluderat av alla reella byggnader i den nuvarande miljön. Den utvecklade funktionen blev i och med det kompatibel på icke djupavkännande enheter och fungerande i en dynamisk urban miljö. För attutvärdera denna funktion så var den implementerad i en sensorbaserad AR applikation som visualiserade en framtida byggnad i Stockholm. Resultatet visade att den utvecklade funktionen ockluderade den virtuella byggnaden som förväntat. Dock gjorde den ej det helt realistiskt, men resultatet från den utförda användarstudien visade att den uppnådde sitt mål. Majoriteten av deltagarna ansåg att deras AR upplevelse blev bättre med den utvecklade funktionen aktiverad och ett deras uppfattning av djup förbättrades. Dock kan inga definitiva slutsatser dras eftersom AR applikationen hade problem med den sensorbaserade spårningen. Resultaten är intressant för det mobila AR fältet eftersom majoriteten av alla smartphones ej har stöd för djupavkänning. Att använda geospatial data för att simulera ocklusion, eller någon annan fysisk interaktion mellan virtuella och reella objekt, kan då vara en tillräckligt effektiv lösning tills djupavkännande AR enheter används mer.

The main drawback of Alternate Reality Gaming, compared to other genres, is that it lacks reusability; typically it cannot be played freely by anyone, anytime, anywhere. However, with the help of modern technology, especially in the mobile devices section, this can be overcome, at least to a certain extent. Therefore, we propose a conceptual framework built upon these challenges raised by other ARGs, a framework meant for game designers and developers that wish to create reusable ARGs, to add reusability to their own ARGs or even turn their digital games into a mixed experience. We designed it by reviewing relevant literature of past ARGs that had a reusable or a digital component, from which we have drawn conclusions and mixed them with our own ideas. Then we tested it iteratively by developing two prototypes and evaluating them through user feedback.

Central venous catheterization (CVC) is performed frequently in clinical practices in Operation Rooms(OR) and Emergency Rooms(ER). CVC is performed for different reasons such as supply nutrition or medicine. For CVC ultrasound (US), diagnostic device is preferable among other medical imaging technologies. Central Venous Catheterization (CVC) under the 2D US guidance requires skills for catheter placement to avoid damaging non-targeted blood vessels. Therefore, there is a great need for improvements in the CVC field where mechanical complication has a risk of occurring during the procedure, for example misplacement of the needle. This master thesis project was performed at Kyushu University department of mechanical engineering and collaboration with Maidashi Kyushu University Hospital department of Advanced Medicine and Innovative Technology in Japan. This thesis is aimed to develop a new simple and cheap guidance system for CVC placement. The system performed on a Tablet PC and will be using already existing Ultrasound machines in Hospitals and Augmented Reality(AR). The project developed a simple AR-System for CVC placement with use of the ArUco library. The new developed system takes information from Ultrasound images and constructs a 3D-model of a vein and artery. Then the 3D-model is augmented on the patient through the tablet PC by using the ArUco library. The construction and augmentation is all performed on the tablet PC and has a small computation to complete the necessary procedures for the 3D-blood vessels. The AR-system has a simple control where the interface of the system is a simple push and action system. When a good visualization of the blood vessels and Doppler effect is shown on the ultrasound machine, the surgeon presses the screen and the image is saved. After about five images are acquired, the system builds the 3D-model and augments it on the patient using a marker. For the development of this system it implemented the waterfall method where each step was tested and checked, before moving to the next step. A full functional system was developed and tested. From the tests performed it is shown that there were limitations due to segmentation and depth perception. But the system has possibilities as an aid for CVC placement.

Spatial Augment Reality (SAR) has presented itself to be an interesting tool for not only interesting ways to visualize information but to develop creative works in performance arts. The main challenge is to determine accurate geometry of a projection space and determine an efficient and effective way to project digital media and information to create an augmented space. In our previous implementation of SAR, we developed a projector-camera calibration approach using infrared markers. However, the projection suffers severe distortion due to the lack of depth information in the projection space. For this research, we propose to develop a RGBD sensor - projector system to replace our current projector-camera SAR system. Proper calibration between the camera or sensor and projector links vision to projection, answering the question of which point in camera space maps to what point in the space of projection. Calibration will resolve the problem of capturing the geometry of the space and allow us to accurately augment the surfaces of volumetric objects and features. In this work three calibration methods are examined for performance and accuracy. Two of these methods are existing adaptations of 2D camera - projector calibrations (calibration using arbitrary planes and ray-plane intersection) with our third proposed novel technique which utilizes point cloud information from the RGBD sensor directly. Through analysis and evaluation using re-projection error, results are presented, identifying the proposed method as practical and robust. / Electrical and Computer Engineering

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