Staff and students from the HCI Group and Computational Media Innovation Centre (CMIC) at Victoria University of Wellington, Empathic Computing Lab at University of Auckland, and HITLabNZ at University of Canterbury are organizing the International XR Workshop in Auckland, New Zealand from  9-12 February 2021 at the University of Auckland.

The XR Workshop will combine taught lectures with hands-on project work with XR technology and HMDs (e.g. HTC Vive, Occulus Quest, Magic Leap, Hololens) and a variety of physiological sensors and input devices. Attendees will work in small groups to each complete an example project by the end of the week. This is a unique opportunity to learn how to develop XR applications from world leading experts in the field.

The XR workshop Theme for 2021 is:

Designing XR Empathic Applications 

What will you learn?

• An introduction to Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, and Mixed Reality and XR technology

• How to design good XR experiences

• How to use the Unity game engine

• How to program for different XR HMDs using Unity

• Evaluating of XR experiences

• XR research directions

Registration

Deadline:  29 January 2021 CLOSED

Form:  https://tinyurl.com/xrworkshop2021

Cost: 

• Free for students. There is some funding available for travel and accommodation for students. 

• $300 NZD for non-students

Remote:

People can participate remotely (but please register), and there will be hubs setup at UNISA, Monash University, and UNSW. See the Remote page for further details.

• Tony Parisi, Unity, USA

• Hrvoje Benko, Facebook Reality Labs Research, USA

• Joaquim Jorge, University of Lisbon, Portugal

• Mark Billinghurst, University of Auckland / UNISA

• Gina Grimshaw, Victoria University of Wellington, NZ

• Sir Ian Taylor, Animation Research Limited, NZ

• Pedro Lopes, University of Chicago, USA

• Danielle Lottridge, University of Auckland, NZ

• Stefan Marks, Auckland University of Technology, NZ

• Nadia Pantidi, Victoria University of Wellington, NZ

• Nilufar Baghaei, Massey University, NZ

• Prasanth Sasikumar, University of Auckland, NZ

• Clovis McEvoy,  Freelance Composer, Germany

• Ruggiero Lovreglio, Massey University, NZ

• Simon McCallum, Victoria University of Wellington, NZ

• Roy Davies, University of Auckland, NZ

• James Everett, NZXR, NZ

• Amber Taylor,  Ara Journeys, NZ

• Melanie Langlotz, GeoAR Games, NZ

• Sakthi Priya Balaji Ranganathan, JIX Reality, NZ

Schedule 

• 8 February (Monday): travel to Auckland

• 9 February (Tuesday): 

  • Invited Speaker #1: Tony Parisi

  • Developing XR applications with Unity

  • Project work

• 10 February (Wednesday): 

  • Invited Speaker #2: Pedro Lopes

  • Invited Speaker #3: Gina Grimshaw

  • UX Design for XR applications

  • Project work

• 11 February (Thursday): 

  • Invited Speaker #3:  Joaquim Jorge

  • Evaluating XR applications

  • XR for Health

  • Project work

• 12 February (Friday): 

  • Invited Speaker #4: Hrvoje Benko

  • Project work

  • Industry Panel

  • Project Presentations and Demos

  • Demo Public Open House (5-8pm)

  • Invited Speaker #6: Sir Ian Taylor

What to Bring

• Your laptop that can run Unity

• VR headset if you have one

Extended reality (XR) is a term referring to all real-and-virtual combined environments and human-machine interactions generated by computer technology and wearables. It includes representative forms such as augmented reality (AR), mixed reality (MR) and virtual reality (VR) and the areas overlapping. XR is a superset which includes the entire spectrum from "the complete real" to "the complete virtual" in the concept of reality–virtuality continuum.

Organizers

• Craig Anslow - Victoria University of Wellington (Contact)

• Mark Billinghurst - University of Auckland

• Amit Barde - University of Auckland

• Allan Fowler - University of Auckland

• Damien Rompapas - University of South Australia

• Joaquim Jorge - University of Lisbon

Workshop Series Organizers:

• Craig Anslow - Victoria University of Wellington

• Mark Billinghurst - University of Auckland

• Rob Lindeman - University of Canterbury

Workshop Series

• 2020 - Wellington

• 2019 - Auckland (Magic Leap Workshop)

Research Labs

• Computation Media Innovation Centre (CMIC), VUW

• Human Computer Interaction (HCI) Group, VUW 

• Human Interface Technology Lab (HITLabNZ), Canterbury

• Empathic Computing Lab, Auckland

Other Links

• Australasian Researchers in Interactive Virtual Environments (ARIVE)

• 2020 - XR Summit  (Auckland)