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Immersion and visualization

University of Southern California, Los Angeles, U.S.

Corresponding author: uneumann@graphics.usc.edu

The first 20% of the full text of this article appears below.

The objectives of immersion and visualization have much in common. Essentially both convey the idea that people's minds are engaged by information that is optimally presented for the human senses, nonrepetitive, and connected. The point of immersion and visualization is always to benefit the person or people involved in performing some task or making decisions, experiencing an event, or understanding and comprehending information. This presentation examines some of the rationales, methods, and examples of immersion and visualization that are pursued at the Integrated Media Systems Center (IMSC) at the University of Southern California.

First, a bit of background information about IMSC is useful to understand the context of our work. IMSC is an Engineering Research Center (ERC) funded primarily from the National Science Foundation. IMSC has about 30 faculty members working together with more than 100 PhD, Masters, and undergraduate students in computer science, electrical engineering, and related disciplines. The major research breakthroughs have come in areas of immersive audio, streaming media, computer vision, computer graphics, wireless networks, perception and cognition, and virtual reality. More about IMSC is found at http://imsc.usc.edu.

Immersion is a term that is broadly understood to describe a state of mind that occurs when someone experiences or becomes absorbed in a stimulating real or virtual space. For example, attending an exciting sporting event or concert; or visiting a beautiful cathedral or museum can be said to "immerse" someone in the place and events around them. Similarly, a good book, movie, or live play can immerse someone in places and events that are imagined and virtual. Visualization is a stimulating presentation of concepts and information such as a graphical data representation, a simulation, or animation. In both cases, people's minds are engaged in an experience that meets three criteria:

1. The presentation language is optimized for human . . . [Full Text of this Article]