Teaching and Learning via the Network
Networked Virtual Art Museum
Project Number Seven - 1992
Dear Ms. Perry,
Please regard this letter as a submission to the EDUCOM'92 call for project
descriptions. I would be very happy to participate in the conference, and
could present extensive document pertaining to the project described below.
I'm director of the Networked Virtual Art Museum, a project of the
STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon University. The project
goal is to employ telecommunications to form a network of immersion
environments, to be used for collaborative education specific to
communication, virtual reality and creative investigation.
To date, our system is operational, virtual worlds are constructed, and the
first public demonstration will be conducted September 10-11, between CMU and
EXPEDITION 92, held in Munich, Germany, sponsored by UNESCO.
For this demonstration users located at both sites with be conjoined in the
same immersion environment, linked by a simple modem to modem connection.
They will see each other and interact with objects simultaneously. One major
advance of the project is to use modems to for realtime networking of
immersion environments. The next phase of the project is to employ servers
and the Internet, followed by broadband telecommunications.
The Information Networking Institute (INI) at CMU has arranged for for an
independent thisis to be conducted with Bellcore employees to resolve
connectivity issues. Our geographic location, Pittsburg, is of advantage to
access the infrastructures provided by PREPnet and NSFnet.
We are forming a grid of participating art schools located in Australia,
Canada, Europe, Japan and in the US to participate in collaborative
learning, utilizing networked virtual reality. We will exchange virtual
worlds, and participate in collaborative design. and form a virtual art
academy.
Project Director
Carl Eugene Loeffler
Research Fellow
STUDIO for Creative Inquiry
College of Fine Arts
Carnegie Mellon University
Loeffler is regarded as a pioneer in telecommunications.
He was co-editor of Art and Telecommunications, a special issue of
Leonardo magazine. His new book, Virtual Realities: Anthology of
Industry and Culture will be published in Japan and the US. Loeffler
has received both an Artist and Critics Fellowship from the National
Endowment for the Arts, and awarded an Arts America Fellowship from
the United States Information Service (USIS).
Project Description
The Networked Virtual Art Museum project supports the design, development
and operation of long distance, multiple user, networked immersion
environments.
The project team will design and construct a multi-cultural art museum
articulated through networked virtual reality, and established by a grid of
participants, or nodes, located in remote geographical locations. The nodes
are inter-connected using modem to modem, or high bandwidth
telecommunications.
Each participating node will have the option to interact with the virtual
environment and contribute to its shape and content. Participants will be
invited to create additions or galleries, install works, or commission
researchers and artists to originate new works for the museum. Further,
guest curators will have the opportunity to organize special exhibitions,
explore advanced concepts, and formulate the basis for critical theory
pertaining to virtual reality and cultural expression.
The museum can also function as a stand-alone installation and is easily
transportable for presentation in cultural or industrial venues.
Key Areas of Investigation
The project supports the design, and development of
long distance, multiple user, networked immersion environments. Key areas
for investigation presented through the project include the following: Visual
art; architectural planning; telecommunications; computer programming; human
interface design and artificial intelligence; behavior and communication
protocol; copyright law; and cost analysis.
Project Goals
Visual Art and Architecture
- The Formation of an Art Museum, which employs networked, virtual reality
communications technology, is the essential basis of the project. The
construction of the virtual Museum invites the participation of visual
artists, architectural planners, Computer Aided Design teams, and other
computer programmers.
Virtual Reality
- The project serves as a testing site for virtual reality software, utilized
for the programming and creation of virtual worlds. Artists, architectural
planners, and computer programmers will collaborate in the authorship
of the museum project.
Telecommunications
- Critical to the communications technology employed,
is the research and implementation of networking approaches, inclusive of
modem to modem, Internet and high bandwidth connectivity (BISDN).
Telecommunications specialists will contribute to the project, and suggest
method for the connectivity required.
Telepresence and Artificial Intelligence
- End user interface, is an essential area of development,
as well as telepresence and the application of artificial intelligence
articulated in the forms of agents, guides, and information objects. The
inclusion of investigators in the areas of interface design and artificial
intelligence are major components.
Groupware and communication protocol
- The project will document multi-user interaction and groupware behavior,
establish protocol within networked immersion environments, and suggest
standards. The contribution of communication specialists will address
appropriate aspects of quantification, documentation, and standardization.
Copyright law
- The project will additionally investigate copyright ownership and protection
of computer software within distributed networks, inclusive of operating
systems, and environments established by public authorship and groupware
applications. The inclusion of consultants versed in international copyright
law and computer software will be encouraged. Suggested approach will be the
formation of a comprehensive copyright agreement for distributed network and
groupware applications.
Cost Analysis
- Other study will address the practical nature of networked immersion
environments, and investigate the potency of information access for the end
user, and typify the end user experience. The project will invite the
participation of cost analysis specialists and formulate a practical cost
basis for networked immersion environments.
Information
Carl Eugene Loeffler
Project Director
Telecommunications and Virtual Reality
STUDIO for Creative Inquiry
College of Fine Arts
Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA
cel+@andrew.cmu.edu
TEL: (412) 268-3452 Fax: (412) 268-2829
Studio For Creative Inquiry
FAX: (412) 268-2829
Announcing the What: Networked Virtual Art Museum Technical Demonstration, to
be conducted at Expedition 92: Launching New Worlds of Learning, Munich,
Germany,. September 10-11, 1992
The Networked Virtual Art Museum is a project directed by Carl Loeffler,
Research Fellow, at the Studio for Creative Inquiry, College of Fine Arts,
CMU. The pioneering project investigates
telecommunications and virtual reality, and provides a basis for multiple
users located in distant geographical locations to be conjoined in the same
virtual, immersion environment. The project employs telecommunication
hardware, as well as the hardware associated with virtual reality: data
eyephones and multi-directional navigation devices.
The immersion environment is an art museum, which contains galleries offering
exhibitions. The exhibition presented for the Munich demonstration is
conceived by Director Carl Loeffler and is titled Fun House. While based
on the traditional concept of the fun house, the exhibition features advanced
programming concepts such as agents with Artificial Intelligence, mirrors
offering reflections, and a game room which explores gravity and other
aspects of physics illustrated by thrown objects.
Considered as a whole, the project is on the advancing edge of
telecommunications thru the exploration of immersion environments, networked
over long distance, while supporting multiple users. The use of agents, and
the articulation of physics and other details like reflective mirrors ,
places the project at the forefront of the design of virtual worlds.
The Networked Virtual Art Museum utilizes the WorldToolKit, a virtual world
development software, available from Sense8 Corporation. The Virtual
Research head mounted display, and the Ascension Technology 6-D mouse (The
Bird), and 486/50 compatible with DVI and MIDI comprise the basic system
hardware.
The first public demonstration of the project will take place September
10-11, in conjunction with Expedition 92: Launching New Worlds of Learning,
held in Munich, Germany., under the auspices of UNESCO and the Commission of
the European Community. Expedition 92 conducts two days of keynote
addresses, workshops, and technical demonstrations. Select participants
include: Michael Eisner, Manager, Disney World; Robert Jacobson, Director,
World Design; Myron Krueger, Producer, Artifical Reality; Kevin McGee, MIT
Media Lab; Siegmund Prillwitz, Director, Institute for Sign Language;
Kristina Hooper Woolsey, Director, MultiMedia Lab, Apple Computer; among many
others.
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