Month: May 2012

Date: 30 May 2012
Time: 13.00-14.00
Place: NJ14 3-228 (Las Vegas)

A system for Do-It-Yourself (DIY) interface designs focused on sound and music computing has been developed. The system is based on the Create USB Interface (CUI), which is an open source microcontroller prototyping board together with the GROVE system of interchangeable transducers. Together, these provide a malleable and fluid prototyping process of ‘Sketching in Hardware’ for both music and non-music interaction design ideas. The most recent version of the board is the CUI32Stem, which is designed specifically to work hand- in-hand with the GROVE elements produced by Seeed Studio, Inc. GROVE includes a growing collection of open source sensors and actuators that utilize simple 4-wire cables to connect to the CUI32Stem. The CUI32Stem itself utilizes a high-performance Microchip® PIC32 microcontroller, allowing a wide range of programmable interactions. The development of this system and its use in sound and music interaction design is described. Typical use scenarios for the system may pair the CUI32Stem with a smartphone, a normal computer, and one or more GROVE elements via wired or wireless connections.

For more information, please see: http://www.seeedstudio.com/wiki/CUI32Stem

Three-dimensional (3D) user interfaces are popular in movies. There are also many current systems that enable people to interact with 3D content, including computer games. We re-investigate the ideas behind such 3D user interfaces and present innovative solutions based on the capabilities and limitations of both humans and technologies.

Bio
Dr. Stuerzlinger graduated with a Doctorate in Computer Science from the Technical University in Vienna, Austria in 1993. Then he moved to the Johannes Kepler University of Linz, Austria. Supported by an Erwin-Schrödinger fellowship Dr. Stuerzlinger visited the Department of Computer Science at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill in 1997 (hosted by Prof. F. Brooks). In 1998, Dr. Stuerzlinger was appointed to the Department of Computer Science at York University in Toronto, Canada. There, he is a full professor and a member of the interdisciplinary Centre for Vision Research (CVR).

While in Austria and at UNC, Dr. Stuerzlinger’s research interests concentrated on various areas of computer graphics, as well as parallel and high-performance systems. At York University he is leading the Interactive Systems Research Group. Dr. Stuerzlinger is a leading researcher in three-dimensional user interfaces and virtual reality. Additionally, he is very active in human-computer interaction. In general, his research aims to find innovative solutions for real-world problems and is often inter-disciplinary. Current research projects include better user interfaces for two-dimensional and three-dimensional design applications, meeting room environments that actively support collaboration, user interface techniques that are based on human perception principles, new virtual reality hardware and software, a novel kind of display system that can display very vivid images, and many other projects.

Dr. Stuerzlinger is a member of the GRAND NCE (Graphics, Animation and New Media Network of Centres of Excellence) board, a journal editorial board, and numerous international program committees. He has also chaired several international scientific events. He is an author of more than a dozen patents. Dr. Stuerzlinger has supervised more than 35 graduate students to completion and published more than 100 refereed scientific papers. His group currently consists of a postdoc and 10 graduate students.