Past Events

Speaker:
David Lindlbauer + Alexandra Ion

Talk on "Automatic Adaptation of Mixed Reality User Interfaces" by Prof. Lindlbauer

Abstract: Mixed Reality (MR) has the potential to transform the way we interact with digital information, and promises a rich set of applications, ranging from manufacturing and architecture to interaction with smart devices. Current MR approaches, however, are static, and users need to manually adjust the visibility, placement and appearance of their user interface every time they change their task or environment. This is distracting and leads to information overload. To overcome these challenges, we aim to understand and predict how users perceive and interact with digital information, and use this information in context-aware MR systems that automatically adapt when, where and how to display virtual elements. We create computational approaches that leverage aspects such as users’ cognitive load or the semantic connection between the virtual elements and the surrounding physical objects. Our systems increase the applicability of MR, with the goal to seamlessly blend the virtual and physical world.

Bio: David is an Assistant Professor at the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, leading the Augmented Perception Lab. His research focuses on understanding how humans perceive and interact with digital information, and to build technology that goes beyond the flat displays of PCs and smartphones to advances our capabilities when interacting with the digital world. To achieve this, he creates and studies enabling technologies and computational approaches that control when, where and how virtual content is displayed to increase the usability of AR and VR interfaces.

Talk on "Interactive structures: creating (meta)materials that move, walk, compute" by Prof. Ion

Abstract: We propose unifying material and machine. We investigate and develop interactive computational design tools that enable digital fabrication of complex structures for novice users. Interactive structures embed functionality within their geometry such that they can react to simple input with complex behavior. Such structures enable materials that can, e.g., embed robotic movement, can perform computations, or communicate with users. We focus on material discovery by broadening participation. We develop optimization-based interactive design tools that enable novices to contribute their creativity and experts to apply their intuition in order to foster the advancement of high-tech materials. We investigate the entire pipeline, i.e., their mechanical structure, the algorithms for efficient design, the unforeseen application areas and fabrication methods.

Bio: Alex is an Assistant Professor at the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science, where she directs the Interactive Structures lab. Her research and expertise lie at the intersection of human-computer interaction, computational fabrication and material engineering. Her work has been published in and awarded by premier venues, including ACM UIST and CHI.