(page updated June 1, 2004)

The Institute of Signal Processing will organize the course 

8004253 Virtual Reality (3 cu)  (previously 8005340)

News: Jan. 30: The ordered copies are now available for sale at TiTe, and will also soon be placed to the archive folders there for copying yourself.
News: June 1: All the exams & lab works have now been graded. For future courses, see http://www.cs.tut.fi/~ira/opetus/vr-tre.html.

The course will be in English in the first quarter of Spring 2004. The course will be an intensive course (4 weeks).

Content of the course:
Lectures 24 h, demonstrations 2 h, laboratory work and an exam. An introductory course to virtual reality. Gives the basic skills to understand and evaluate VR systems, applications and simulators, and its impact on future digital systems and user interfaces. The course fits to students of various fields of technology. A small laboratory work is required. Accepted as a post graduate course.

Literature:
The course book is the Handbook of Virtual Environments - Design, Implementation and Applications, edited by Kay Stanney (Online from Erlbaum, US$95.00). You don't have to read all of the book. The chapters for the exam are: 1-5, 8-10, 12-13, 19, 24, 30, 39, 42, 47, 52, 55-56. The book can be seen at my office. 

In addition the following materials:
Future Multimedia User Interfaces,
An Introduction to 3D User Interface Design, and
Recent Advances in Augmented Reality

and copies of the lecture material. You can order a set of the lecture material in the first week of the lectures, or copy yourself later from TiTe archives.

Lecture time and place: First period of Spring 2004 (intensive 4 weeks).
THURSDAY 9 - 12, TB111, Ismo Rakkolainen
FRIDAY 9 - 12, TB111, Ismo Rakkolainen
See the schedule below about exact times and places.

Information on prerequisites:
Computer graphics course (8101910, 8402065, or corresponding) is required. 

Laboratory work: See info page at http://www.vrc.tut.fi/kurssit/virtual_reality/. The lab work will be made in groups of 2-3. The work can be either an easy coding task at TUT VR Center, or a literary survey: instructions in Englishinstructions in Finnish. The coding task is guided and checked by Jani Tikkanen at VR Center, Jani.Tikkanen(at)tut.fi. Ismo Rakkolainen will check the literary surveys and some lab works. The deadline for the work is April 25, 2004.
A bad lab work will be dismissed, a good one will pass, and an excellent work can gain some 1-6 extra points, if the work is done well and has taken some effort. The Extra points may upgrade the grading by one, even two levels.
The laboratory work and exam should be made during the same year. It may well be that the future courses are not compatible, or are not arranged every year.

Course manager: Dr.Tech. Ismo Rakkolainen, ismo.rakkolainen(at)tut.fi
Lab work: Jani Tikkanen, Jani.Tikkanen(at)tut.fi, VR Center

Schedule:
Jan. 8, Lecture 1. Introduction to course and VR, VR history
Jan. 9, Lecture 2. Applications of VR, videoclips
Jan. 13 (Tuesday), Excursion. 1.5 h visit to TUT VR Center in groups of max. 15 persons (limited space). A registration list will be circulated in the first lectures.
Jan. 15, Lecture 3. Application Case: Finnair flight simulators. Augmented reality. VR and user interfaces.
Jan. 16, Lecture 4. VR and user interfaces. Human senses and VR. Audio in VR.
Jan. 20, Lecture 5. VR displays (Tuesday, TB219)
Jan. 22, Lecture 6. Haptics, tracking, 3D graphics, 3D modeling, VR software.
Jan. 23, Lecture 7. Networked VR. Web3D (VRML, Java 3D, MPEG-4, etc.).
Jan. 29, Lecture 8. Tools and info for the lab work (Jani Tikkanen), forming of lab work groups. Lab work tools info

Exams:
You have three chances: February 24th, April 19th, or May 14th.
Register for the exam at oinfo system!

You can also give feedback about the course at https://oinfo.tut.fi/.



Other useful courses:

8005915 VR licentiate seminar (3 ov)
7407001 Virtuaalitodellisuuden työkurssi (3 ov)
74490 Moderni käyttöliittymäelektroniikka (3 ov)
74465 Näyttötekniikat (3 ov)
81163 Tietokonegrafiikka (4 ov)
8402065 Computer Graphics (2-3 ov)
Digitaalinen kuvankäsittely 1, 2 ja 3
Other multimedia courses
8402070 Multimedia Systems Design (2-3 ov)
1100500 Arkkitehtuurin visualisointi (3 ov)
24230 CAD jatkokurssi (2 ov)
2601050 Robotics and teleoperation (4 ov)
2601020 Hydraulijärjestelmien mallinnus ja simulointi (3 ov)
2601030 Hydraulijärjestelmien mallintamisen ja simuloinnin jatkokurssi (3 ov)
New Interaction Techniques (Tampere University)


The Top Eleven Reasons VR has not yet become commonplace (Lanier's opinion)

Some (old) VR links in web.

Page manager Ismo Rakkolainen, ismo.rakkolainen(at)tut.fi.