Page 31 - Campus Technology, June 2017

COMPLETE GUIDE TO VIRTUAL REALITY
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designers to quickly prototype full-scale designs, be it architecture or a product, and immediately see any shortcomings in their design iteration. “I’ve been using VR in my classroom and I’ve seen students demonstrate a richer understanding of their designs through the use of VR,” said Jon Racek, senior lecturer in the School of Art and Design. “Students can experience if the scale, proportion and other spatial qualities of their designs are appropriate.”
This past semester in Racek’s class, Fortune 500 company Kimball asked students to help imagine new co-working spaces. The students used VR to present their final proposals to Kimball in a much richer way than computer renderings would have allowed. The furniture designs were then prototyped using 3D printers and laser cutters. Students used VR to test out new ideas more quickly and easily than making a 3D print. They could switch back to their 3D modeling software and make changes, and then jump back into VR to see their fixes in full scale. VR allows for a richer and more complete understanding of their designs than a 2D drawing or computer rendering on their monitors.
In the School of Art and Design, associate professor Margaret Dolinsky stated, “My goal is to have students bring their imagination and research interests to the virtual worlds that they create. I would like them to define virtual reality as its own medium, separate from the tropes used in video games or cinema, and to concentrate on how they offer an experience to their visitors.” As VR becomes more accessible and affordable, Dolinsky encourages students — especially women and minority students — to combine aesthetics and creative technologies. “For my classes, I focus on the experiential phenomena of art making and perception shifting using a variety of virtual strategies — digital drawing, digital painting and digital sculpting as well as scanning and photographic techniques to create virtual worlds.” 4
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CAMPUS TECHNOLOGY | June 2017