Effective Virtual Environments

Applications using virtual environment (VE) systems are as diverse as the technologies that enable the systems: They include training; rehabilitation; virtual tours of heritage sites, imaginary places, scientific data, and reconstructed crime scenes; immersive art experiences; and entertainment and games using immersive VEs. Hardware and software technologies include game engines, graphics, trackers, displays, and user input/output devices and techniques. While commodity products are making it easier to build VE systems, there is still research needed to understand how to compute and deliver a VE experience that creates an illusion of being in another world and of being in a plausible world—one that behaves as you expect it to. Research in the Effective Virtual Environments (EVE) group has addressed most of these topics at one time or another.