Archive notice: This article was originally published on August 2, 2005. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
Some of the installations have an artistic touch, some are a technical novelty, others simply a funny adaptation of an already existing technology: What all exhibits in Siggraph’s “Emerging Technologies” area have in common is the interaction between people and technology.
In a dark hall, 32 interactive installations are on display, at some of which strange things can be seen: At their stand, for example, the NTT Communication Science Laboratories show how the human sense of balance can be manipulated with the help of small electrical impulses. After signing a declaration that you will not sue the operators of the stand, you are given headphones that place an electrode behind each ear. Small electrical impulses disturb the organ of balance in such a way that you lean to the side to counteract gravity that is apparently rotating. A remote control can be used to control the direction and strength of the human swaying and thus tempt the test subject into a slalom run, even though he actually wants to walk straight ahead. This technology could, for example, be coupled with a driving simulator in order to experience the car’s centrifugal force live along with it – an interesting approach for the games industry, for example.
At another stand, you can virtually canoe. The paddle is an aluminium bar connected at both ends by three cords each to electric motors. The motors simulate the resistance of the water and register the paddle movements. The two projector images below and in front of the canoeist are changed accordingly, just as if he were actually travelling in a canoe.
A similar simulation can be seen directly opposite: Here, with a virtual dragon, VR goggles and artificial wind in your face, you can take a virtual sightseeing flight over Rio de Janeiro. You lie on a kind of stretcher that turns and tilts in accordance with the virtual flight movements. The VR goggles convey a three-dimensional image of the environment. However, the stand fan is not computer-controlled, but is intended only as an additional gag.
