Lab's audiovisual technology enables 3-D virtual reality

IU's Advanced Visualization Lab has developed and licensed its first eight John-e-Box 3-D stereo display systems.\n"The John-e-Box is a portable large format display system that allows many people to stand around it at the same time in order to share visual information," said Eric Wernert, senior scientist and manager for the AVL.\nThe AVL is a unit of University Information Technology Services that supports visualization, virtual reality, and visual collaboration technology for research, education, high end graphics and high end activities, Wernert said.\nThe John-e-Box is especially useful for viewing 3-D models of molecules, architectural plans or data sets. The effect is similar to that of an IMAX movie or the perennial child's toy, the viewfinder.\nSimilar devices in the past lacked the portability of the John-e-Box, which measures just 4 feet by 4 feet by 4 feet when unfolded and 4 feet by 4 feet by 1 foot when traveling from place to place.\n"With devices in the past you had to take people to a lab to use them, but the John-e-Box comes with them wherever they are," Wernert said.\nThe John-e-Box is also much more affordable than similar devices that can't be transported.\n"In 1997, a similar device called the Immersadesk was purchased at IUPUI which cost over $200,000," Wernert said. "The John-e-Box costs just under $20,000. It could even be written into a grant as opposed to previous machines which only the largest research projects could afford. That's not exactly cheap, but it's still much more affordable."\nThere is a also a large-scale VR device at this campus as well, called the Cave Automatic Virtual Environment, or just "CAVE," which allows several students to simultaneously experience a simulated environment on screens all 360 degrees around them.\nThe John-e-Box is by no means meant to replace this system.\n"The CAVE is a valuable facility," Wernert said. "But we only have one on campus, and it can't be moved from location to location, and its use has to be scheduled. The John-e-Box is just trying to push this technology into the classroom. It makes people much more likely to use it."\nMargaret Dolinsky, an associate professor with the School of Fine Arts, said she sees portability as the main advantage of the John-e-Box.\n"As an artist it's important for me to get my work out there, and there are no museums in the U.S which have CAVEs," Dolinsky said. "The John-e-Box is a much more affordable, portable way of getting your artwork displayed that doesn't require much technical assistance."\nHowever, she believes the CAVE can be much more effective at displaying an artist's vision.\n"They're very different," Dolinsky said. "The CAVE is much more immersive. There are screens around you, above you, and below you. The John-e-Box only has one screen so it isn't quite as immersive."\n-- Contact staff writer Chris Freiberg at wfreiber@indiana.edu.