Virtualizing Real-Life Lectures with vAcademia, Kinect, and iPad

Abstract

In this paper, we present a project aiming at designing a low-cost technological setup for translating real-life lectures into a 3D virtual world. We present the design of the first prototype where we record the voice of a lecturer, presentation slides, and use a motion-capture technique to grasp gestures. Based on these data, we create a scene in a 3D virtual world, display the slides, play the recorded sound, and animate the lecturer's avatar. We discuss evaluation results and discovered limitations, and outline solutions. In addition, we propose the major types of learning scenarios for the use of the designed system. © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014.