Group items tagged

Computer science researchers at the University of Washington and Cornell University are deploying a system that will blend teamwork and collaboration with powerful graphics algorithms to create three-dimensional renderings of buildings, neighborhoods and potentially even entire cities.

To improve the quality of their rendering capabilities, the researchers plan to integrate their computing system with a social game that will permit competing teams to add images where they are most needed to improve the quality of the visual models. The PhotoCity game is already being played by teams of students at the University of Washington and Cornell, and the researchers plan to open it to the public in an effort to collect three-dimensional renderings in cities like New York and San Francisco. Contestants will be able to use either an iPhone application that uses the phone’s camera, or upload collections of digital images.

“The obvious thing to do is to try to mobilize a lot of people and get them to go out and take snapshots that contribute to this 3-D reconstruction,” he said. “But maybe if enough people are involved someone will come up with a better idea of how to go about doing this.”

This project is the result of a collaboration in ubiquitous computing and documentary storytelling at the new media department at the University of Maine. We set out to build a storytelling and rich media tool using the specific physical characteristics of the iPad.

After earning first place in the regional competition, West Virginia Uncovered was named a national finalist and was one of three projects recognized nationwide as Best Independent Online Student Publication for a large university.

“MediaStorm is like a garage band. We work at home in our socks, but we have distribution all over the world across a variety of platforms.”

Minutes after Apple unveiled its widely anticipated iPad on Jan. 27, ACU's student-run Optimist declared it would be the first collegiate newspaper to publish on the new device.

The Optimist app now appears in the Apple store and is downloadable on the first wave of the devices.

"The students were doing the coding, the students were doing the planning, students were doing the design," said Dr. Kenneth Pybus, assistant professor of journalism and mass communication and faculty adviser for The Optimist. "It might have gone smoother it if were top-down, but smooth is not what we're going for – education is what we're going for, and education isn't always smooth."