Projects
Life of a Meteor
Is a project to create a state of the art touch display wall. This media wall connects to a scientific database that tracks meteor strikes across the Northern Hemisphere and displays these objects on the touch wall.
As an interpretive exhibit it will teach users about meteor science and astronomy helping users understand the origins of our solar system. The project is an NSF funded collaborative grant between Lowell Observatory and Northern Arizona University.
Project team:
Visual Lead: Graham Hagerty. Visual Developer: Oly Noneza, Trevor Russo, Jade Luther, Josh Dingman.
ChemVR, Virtual Reality Learning Tool
ChemVR is a molecular drawing tool designed to teach Organic Chemistry to undergraduate students at NAU. The tool allows learners the ability to directly manipulate molecular structures in virtual space. In the fall of 2018 Dr. Miller P.h.d, conducted an extensive study with 65 participants to study how effectively people learn in virtual space. ChemVR is now being deployed in Organic Chemistry Classes at NAU.
Project Team:
Norm J Medoff, Robert Rasmussen, John Ebrahim, Dr. Michell Miller, Dr. Ed Civitello
Vanishing Rivers
This 360 Aerial documentary makes tangible the changing landscape of the American Southwest as it explores the upper reaches of the Colorado River down to Lake Mead and Phoenix, where we can see the stark reminders of the river’s decline. With funding from the Hearst foundation this virtual reality documentary shows the implications of climate change. The cinematography team is preparing to fly a DJI Matrice 600 Pro drone, capable of carrying a 13-pound camera. The drone is being specially modified by NAU’s Engineering Department to hold and stabilize a Kandao 360 camera.
Project Team:
Producer: Norman J. Medoff, Script and Science Consultant: Peter Federici, Script Writer: Daniel Bannik, Cinematography Director: Eric Lynch, Cinematographer: Joshua Favela, Pilot: Colin Giles, Audio Engineer: Javier Parra, Music Composer: Garrett Bowers.
ARORA, Geospatial Games for Well Being
The ARORA Geospatial Games for Indigenous Communities mobile app. Under development through a collaboration between. The idea behind ARORA is to teach indigenous youths emotional wellness through geo-social games. Some of the games within the app are designed to teach empathy and compassion, as variations on mindfulness exercises, while other games are meant to create resilience. Some will be collaborative, while others will be single-player. This includes mindfulness walking, breathing exercises, and an AR butterfly collection game.
A back-end architecture will allow a psychologist to track and compile data on users’ moods, states, and interactions with others. The mobile app is also being designed to run on edge networks for remote communities.
Project team:
PI: Morgan Vigil Hayes, Visual Developer: John Abrahim, Visual Designer: Nikole Awbery, Front End Developer: Keller Mikkelson, Project manager: Alex Mclaughlin Developer: Andrew Munoz, Graphic Design: Josh Dingman, 3D specialist: Dominic Torricelli.
Mayan Kings Procession, VR Cinema
The Mayan King’s Procession is a digital reconstruction of a Mayan site in St. Ignacio, Beliz. Dr. Jaime Awe, archaeologist and assistant professor at NAU, studies the Mayan history of the region.
This project proposes to create
an immersive reconstruction of the Mayan site and create a first-person experience of the burial of a Mayan King.
Project Team:
Dr. Jaime Awe Assistant Professor, Anthropology Department
Virtual Geologist, VR data visualization
The Virtual Geologist is a data visualization tool that allows scientists to enter a queryable database in VR. Using LIDAR, and multispectral data captured from UAV’s. The project team is interested in creating a full virtual environment where scientists can query the visual field and explore the geological features of a virtual landscape.
The promise of this tool is to create a virtual geology tool that can be used to explore extraterrestrial landscape such as Mars or Asteroids.
Project Team:
David Trilling, Dominic Torricelli, Bryce Wilson, Noah Confrey
Beyond the Stars, Meditations and Mindfulness Stories
360 Animation and storytelling
Artist and Art Therapist Arturo Solari creates stories that teach mindfulness and Meditation. His influences include Buddhist and Hindu imagery to create beautiful and delightful imagery that was turned into an immersive 360 video. The AML hand drew and animated the story elements to create an immersive VR video of his work.
Project Team: Arturo Solari