Paint the Town, City of Clearwater, Augmented Reality
Our team created an Augmented Reality application for the City of Clearwater's mural project, in
collaboration with the USF Access 3D lab. The Advanced Visualization Center team was tasked with turning a
100 ft mural into an augmented reality experience. We developed triggers and trackers to display 3D and
video content over specific locations of the mural to deliver information about the City of Clearwater and
the mural project to the user. This initial app is available on
Apple's App store
and
Google Play. The Team created a framework to enable additional murals in future versions of the app.
The Virtual Microscopy site was developed by the Advanced Visualization Center in collaboration with
faculty and students from USF Health's Morsani College of Medicine.
This project is funded by USF Health Technology Fees (Project HTFR0001127) aimed to improve student access
to advanced technologies.
The goal of the site was to provide a web-based method for viewing extremely large microscopy slide
images, to be used as a visual aid for teachers and academics.
Originally, the college had a viewer written in Flash. When Flash was deprecated, the college contracted
the AVC to re-implement the old viewer using modern web technologies, as well as adding new features.
Features of the new site:
View large image files generated by the microscopy equipment used by the college on the web
Annotate the slides in the viewer with shapes and pins
Display information about the currently viewed slide, such as the magnification and description
Share annotations and views via urls
Allow select faculty users to upload new slides to the slide database
Search the slide database by tags, or browse by category
VA Patient Fall Simulation
The Advanced Visualization Center came up with and created a virtual reality application to study and
collect data on how VA nurses respond to a patient falling during a wheelchair transfer. The custom
application uses the Valve Index to track 10 points on the participants body, including: head, hands, and
back. The simulation was developed using Unity, Autodesk Maya, and Adobe software. The application
requires a participant to enter the VR headset and to wear the trackers on the body. An operator uses the
simulation interface on the VR PC to start and stop the simulation, and to trigger the patient 3D avatar
Fall. Data is collected on the position and forces of all points of the participant, as well as the 3D
avatar. This scenario was developed to mirror a bathroom in which a “caregiver” can react in a VR
environment using sensors and controllers as a patient who is transferring begins to fall. This “original
scenario” can be tested and expanded upon further, and provides an innovative and safe method for studying
and training.
Virtual Reality as a Therapy Adjunct for Fear of Movement in Veterans With Chronic Pain
For this project we assisted the Tampa, James A. Haley VA, with the implementation of virtual reality
application for a research study involving patients with chronic pain. Our role was to make technology
recommendations, determine appropriate VR applications for a hierarchy ranging from low-intensity pain
distraction to high-intensity movement-based exposure, and to assist with the setup and use of the virtual
reality hardware.
The publication "Virtual Reality as a Therapy Adjunct for Fear of Movement in Veterans With Chronic Pain: Single-Arm
Feasibility Study" ( Fowler CA, Ballistrea LM, Mazzone KE, Martin AM, Kaplan H, Kip KE, Ralston K, Murphy JL, Winkler SL.
JMIR Form Res 2019;3(4):e11266,. doi: 10.2196/11266)
can be found here.
Immersive Virtual Reality to Improve Outcomes in Veterans With Stroke
In collaboration with the Tampa James A. Haley VA we assisted with the implementation of Virtual Reality
technologies for a research study on the use of VR as a therapeutic platform for pain distraction and
exercise for stroke patients. Specifically, this was done to determine the feasibility and tolerability of
using a therapeutic VR platform in an inpatient comprehensive stroke rehabilitation program and to
estimate the initial clinical efficacy (effect size) associated with the VR platform using apps for pain
distraction and upper extremity exercise for post-stroke neurologic recovery. We also implemented a data
collection system to track utilization of the apps by patients.
The publication "Immersive Virtual Reality to Improve Outcomes in Veterans With Stroke: Protocol for a Single-Arm Pilot
Study" (Tran JE, Fowler CA, Delikat J, Kaplan H, Merzier MM, Schlesinger MR, Litzenberger S, Marszalek JM,
Scott S, Winkler SL Immersive Virtual Reality to Improve Outcomes in Veterans With Stroke: Protocol for a
Single-Arm Pilot Study JMIR Res Protoc 2021;10(5):e26133 doi:
10.2196/26133) can be found
here.
Reconstructing CAAL
This website, built by the AVC, is the result of a collaborative project, RECAAL ("reconstructing CAAL").
The aim of the project was to digitally reconstruct the first humanities computing center, CAAL. The idea
behind CAAL was to use IBM punched-card machines to process language instead of numbers, to treat language
as data, an innovative idea at the time. After several years in temporary locations, in 1961 the operation
moved into a former textile factory in Gallarate, outside Milan, where IBM punched-card data processing
machines were installed. Teams of student operators, most of them young women, along with scholars at
Father Busa's college in Gallarate, the Aloisianum, worked there for six years (1961-1967) on a lemmatized
concordance to the works of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Index Thomisticus, as well as on other projects using
the method of punched-card data processing.
The AVC both reconstructed the center from photographs and created a website to provide information,
showcase the reconstructed 3D model, and host some of the documents that were handled by the center.
The publication "WHITEPAPER and Final Performance Report: “Reconstructing the First Humanities Computing Center”: NEH
Digital Humanities Advancement Grant HAA-255991-17 USF, TAMPA, FL, 2017-2019" (Steven Jones, Howard Kaplan, Julianne Nyhan, Marco Passarotti, Geoffrey Rockwell, Paola Senna, Stéfan
Sinclair, Melissa Terras)
can be found here.
ARPA
AR-enhanced learning, was developed in collaboration with
Dr. Sanghoon Park, College of Education, and is an
innovative form of instructional technology that enables students to experience a real-time view of a
physical world through augmented reality delivered digital learning content. The application was developed
for both Android and iOS tablets.
This project involved many different technologies, including:
3D modelling and 3D animation were used to create the three-dimensional avatar.
3D printing was used to create the AR cubes.
Unity3D was used to create the interactive experience
and deploy to Android and iOS.
AR Engineering Building Demonstration
The AR Engineering Building demonstration is an AR-powered
walk-through of a three story building proposed by the
USF Engineering department. Using
architectural renders, the Advanced Visualization Center created 3D models of the buildings exterior and
interior. A custom interface and tracking system was developed to enable navigation of the building in the
augmented / mixed reality space. Using a mobile tablet, the app allows users to view the building
interactively from any angle, and features navigation buttons to display each floor, specific rooms, and
the exterior environment.
Dozier Fire Simulation
The Advanced Visualization Center, in Collaboration with
Dr. Erin Kimmerle, of the
USF Institute of Forensic Anthropology and Applied Sciences, created a 3D simulation of the Dozier School for Boys fire that took place on
. The recreation was generated using 3D modeling and
animation software. The digital models of the school were also 3D printed in sections so that viewers
could see the layout more clearly. Other artifacts were also scanned, 3D printed, and shared virtually.
The Virtual Patient Safety project is an educational Virtual Environment designed to train nursing staff
on the proper procedures for preventing and responding to patient falls. Made in collaboration with the
VA, the Advanced Visualization Center (AVC) designed and built 3D models including Avatars, virtual bots,
the virtual environment and all of the assets. The AVC also generated the animations and avatar control
systems. The simulation featured a full interactive 3D virtual environment in which the user plays the
part of a nurse responding to a patient fall. An instructional system was developed to capture data about
each user's interaction in the virtual space, as they answered multiple choice questions, input free text
observations, and their time taken at each stage of the simulation. Feedback was also given to the user
after each response location.
Archaeopteryx HoloLens Viewer
The Advanced Visualization center developed a one-of-a-kind
HoloLens application in
collaboration with Dr. Ryan Carney that allows
the user to see a virtual reconstruction of a specimen of Archaeopteryx in augmented
reality. The AVC created the app with features that allow the user to see the 3D specimen both as it was
found in the fossil, and also as an animated complete skeleton. Interactive modes also allow the user to
control the wings of Archaeopteryx. This project received widespread attention through
Dr. Ryan Carney both by Fox News and National Geographic.
The Virtual Reality Adrenergic Pharmacology module is a groundbreaking collaboration between the Advanced
Visualization Center and USF College of Pharmacy. Working with Dr. Daniel Lee, the AVC created a virtual
reality experience for the Oculus Go that allowed students to learn about adrenergic pharmacology visually
and immersively.
The Florida Postcards project was initiated by
Laura Runge, PhD. in order to
visualize the world's largest Florida Postcard database, contained within the
USF Library.
This project was written in HTML/CSS/Javascript and designed to run as a website.
The visualizations created included:
A timeline of postcards
An interactive map plotting the postcard sender and receiver coordinates
An interactive dashboard with which users can explore the data in depth and search for specific cards
