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CORDIScovery podcast- Episode #6 - Virtual Reality
This is an AI transcription.
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:32:23
Abigail Acton
This is CORDIScovery .Hello. This is CORDIScovery, and I'm Abigail Acton. Today we will be exploring the reality of virtual reality. Is there a headset heading your way or are the cast and the relatively limited content going to hold back uptake for yet a while? Digital communication has flourished for many of us during the pandemic.
00:00:33:03 - 00:00:53:11
Abigail Acton
We've accepted, indeed welcomed what might have been novel methods of contact for many of us. So are we now hungry for the next evolution in digital communications? Is there a virtual reality revolution around the corner? If so, how can the technology be applied? Will VR be just another bone of contention between screen addicted adolescents and their frazzled parents?
00:00:53:13 - 00:01:17:11
Abigail Acton
Or can the inherent characteristics of virtual reality communicating at a distance? But in a space that feels intimate, be harnessed to really revolutionize the way we interact? My guests today, who have been supported by the EU's horizon 2020 program, may be able to tell us virtual reality avatars, digital representations of ourselves, a way to foster empathy or yet another medium providing a cloak of anonymity that can be abused.
00:01:17:13 - 00:01:38:09
Abigail Acton
A very warm. Welcome to Doctor Salvador Alvidrez Marie Curie, research fellow at Queen's University Belfast. Salvador is interested in the socio psychological effects of communication technologies. He is the principal investigator of the ContactVIRT project, which is looking into the use of virtual reality for reducing sectarian prejudice. Hello Salvador.
00:01:38:14 - 00:01:40:00
Salvador Alvidrez
Hi. Thank you Abigail.
00:01:40:02 - 00:02:01:03
Abigail Acton
Co-Ordinator of the Didymos Project. Doctor Veronica Orvalho is fascinated by the ways in which people communicate and share knowledge. She has used her engineering and research backgrounds to create the Didimo Company, which has patented technology to generate digital humans. Veronica's inventions have been used by Microsoft, universal, Sony and others. Welcome, Veronica.
00:02:01:05 - 00:02:02:00
Veronica Orvalho
Hello.
00:02:02:02 - 00:02:18:19
Abigail Acton
Sergi Fernandez director of the media and internet unit at IT CAT is a computer engineer and researcher. Sergi’s background is in natural language processing and he has recently been focusing on immersive and interactive systems. He was the VRTogether project co-ordinator. Welcome, Sergey.
00:02:18:21 - 00:02:21:06
Sergi Fernandez
Hi, Abigail. It's a pleasure.
00:02:21:08 - 00:02:37:01
Abigail Acton
Salvador, I have a couple of questions for you. Believe it or not, the ContactVIRT Project has been exploring how virtual reality can be used to bring divided communities closer together. Can I ask you, how did you first get interested in the way that technology affects our communication?
00:02:37:03 - 00:03:01:20
Salvador Alvidrez
Well, I guess that these all started many years ago when the, you know, the text messaging feature Western first introducing mobile phones. So we are talking about many years ago. I was intrigued, about how sometimes it's easier to de-escalate conflicts just by using text messages. I mean, in contrast to, trying to solve it, face to face, in which sometimes you make it worse.
00:03:01:21 - 00:03:24:09
Salvador Alvidrez
I actually, I, I was also intrigued by, how, sometimes it's also easier to, to make social phones with people that otherwise, you know, in real life and face to face, interaction is, kind of difficult. So, communication technologies can actually be useful tools for reducing conflict and, improving social relationships.
00:03:24:12 - 00:03:31:05
Abigail Acton
Very interesting. And which areas are you particularly interested in looking at at the moment? What what are you studying at the moment for this?
00:03:31:07 - 00:04:05:02
Salvador Alvidrez
I'm working particularly with the impression information, line of research. So, for instance, in VR, I'm working about how to, put certain elements in the virtual environment, affect the way in which, users identify with, social category and thus, the whole elements associated to, these categories, such as, for instance, I can see, you know, this, former enemy as a part of my new group online.
00:04:05:04 - 00:04:08:18
Salvador Alvidrez
So, that's, that's out of line of research currently.
00:04:08:21 - 00:04:16:24
Abigail Acton
Okay, fascinating. We've got used to digital conferencing tools which bring people together at a safe distance. So what's the additional benefit of VR?
00:04:17:01 - 00:04:40:14
Salvador Alvidrez
I think that the main difference is the illusion of presence. Because, for instance, in two meetings, people are conscious that conversations are constrained only by, what you see in the, in the screen frame. In virtual reality, users actually move in a three dimensional space in which, they interact and feel as if they are present in that environment.
00:04:40:16 - 00:05:07:00
Salvador Alvidrez
This illusion is closer to what our senses interpret as, reality. So, making social interactions more vivid. Of course, interactions always depend, upon the state of their relationships offline because it's, it's not the same having interaction with someone that you already know, someone that you consider a friend or someone that you consider an enemy.
00:05:07:05 - 00:05:07:11
Salvador Alvidrez
Right.
00:05:07:14 - 00:05:20:00
Abigail Acton
And, your research, I mean, that's very true. And it's interesting, but what I'm curious to know, then when when you actually put people together to see how this worked out in practice, can I ask you who who your subjects were and what did you find?
00:05:20:02 - 00:05:46:17
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes, I, I ran this, this previous study, in, in the US, some years ago. And, and by that time, I was interested on how to use PR for reducing, prejudice towards ethnic minorities. I used for only students because most of the time I use, experimental study. So I use a students who volunteers, they customize, their avatars.
00:05:46:17 - 00:06:22:24
Salvador Alvidrez
They were asked to customize their avatars to either look like, themselves. I mean, their physical traits, skin color and so on, or to look like someone totally different from them. And, this was just before having the interaction with the person of the minority. And, our findings, were really interesting because, apparently, they, they felt more confident and, prejudice was reducing the conditions in which they, were so to say, anonymous, because they, they were looking like someone different from them.
00:06:23:01 - 00:06:39:15
Salvador Alvidrez
And, I think that, you know, they, they, they, removed this, social pressure or of, feeling accountable when they are having an interaction, even if, this is only an avatar based interaction.
00:06:39:16 - 00:07:03:11
Abigail Acton
No. That's fascinating. And perhaps also it relieves the pressure of having to appear to support the group that you belong to, even if the group that you belong to might have feelings or believes that you find perhaps too extreme or too strong, but you feel that you're obliged to go along with the crowd. Whereas if you have the anonymity of an avatar, maybe you can actually express a more moderate position without fearing that people are going to condemn you from your own group.
00:07:03:11 - 00:07:04:13
Abigail Acton
Is that something you found?
00:07:04:14 - 00:07:28:22
Salvador Alvidrez
Certainly, certainly. For instance, there's a this, line of research in which, the clothes you're using with your avatar sometimes influence the pictures you have about yourself. So for instance, if, people are, using, black, ropes or black dresses tend to be more, aggressive than, people wearing avatars in white clothes.
00:07:28:22 - 00:07:51:09
Salvador Alvidrez
And that's because they are internalizing, well, a series of, associations with the colors and so on. So, the same happens with people playing with, this kind of identity. So, if I am seeing, like a member of this group who might be very prejudiced and I change my features to look like someone that doesn't belong to that group.
00:07:51:09 - 00:07:55:13
Salvador Alvidrez
Yeah, that that might improve, you know, the the the interaction, actually.
00:07:55:13 - 00:08:09:09
Abigail Acton
That's very interesting. It's a little bit like putting prisoners in pink overalls and stuff like that to mitigate violence and stuff. Does anyone have any questions for Salvador? I think this is fascinating. Veronica. Maybe. Perhaps you too, because you're interested in the notion of avatars in the demo.
00:08:09:11 - 00:08:38:11
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah, definitely. It's, It's fascinating. Salvador, what you've just shared. I was actually wondering when you mentioned about the accountability of actually seeing yourself or not seeing yourself on the virtual space. How do you think about the responsibility concept? I so if I, if I actually see myself in a virtual world, I need to really need like how does responsibility changes if I don't see myself and I see someone else that I control?
00:08:38:13 - 00:08:41:21
Salvador Alvidrez
You mean in terms of, like, self constraining?
00:08:41:22 - 00:09:05:06
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah, definitely. Like if I see myself when I post a picture of myself on, on a social media, I would be more careful of what I do because it's actually my image, my faith, my body. I wonder in your experiments or experiences that you've done, if you've found any correlation in terms of responsibility with seeing yourself in the virtual world, does that make sense?
00:09:05:07 - 00:09:33:18
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Of course. For instance, the the site model. Wow. That's a I'm not going to be too into, very theoretical terms. So basically when do you feel accountable, do you feel like I committed, once I that you are, in, in in, in the better world, you feel committed to hold these, personality because it's not only when you think about yourself, it's also what you think the others are thinking about.
00:09:33:18 - 00:10:11:13
Salvador Alvidrez
Or aspect about yourself in terms of, of your physical appearance. And, you know, this is very interesting because, for instance, with this, a new, line of research, for, perspective taking, they ask people to, to embody avatars belonging to different, to stigmatized social groups. I mean, in order to put in the shoes of other person and, these, instills empathy, and, and this is all based on the self-perception of, of being in the shoes of, of of a member of a stigmatized group.
00:10:11:15 - 00:10:33:13
Salvador Alvidrez
Now, you have to imagine that, this kind of effect, it was not found on people that look like themselves. I mean, to the group, they belong. So, yes, there's a commitment. Once you are identifiable, we call it that accountability because you are accountable in terms of now in terms of, responsibility to for your actions.
00:10:33:13 - 00:10:42:20
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Somehow you are responsible, but only in terms of what you think, the others are expecting from you.
00:10:42:22 - 00:10:46:18
Abigail Acton
Any other questions at all? Sergi Yes, please.
00:10:46:20 - 00:11:10:15
Sergi Fernandez
Yes. Salvador, thank you for your explanations. Which use cases, I mean, let's say which conflicts examples. Can you explain us and then also which are the difficulties that you find when, you try to scale these into certain conflicts? Let's say the conflict itself makes this interaction impossible.
00:11:10:17 - 00:11:52:24
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Of course. Thank you for the question. It's very interesting. That goes, for instance, obviously, when the, the level of conflict is, you know, they've reached a point in which, nobody wants to have any kind of interaction at all. Not in person, neither in the, in a virtual environment. And so, these kind of, tools, actually don't, won't work, but you can use it as a tool, together with other, strategies, you can use technological tools like VR or, text messaging or having, a friend of a friend who is, friend of that group and so on.
00:11:52:24 - 00:12:00:22
Salvador Alvidrez
But you have to increase, the number of, social cues, so to say, before having a face to face interaction.
00:12:00:24 - 00:12:03:12
Abigail Acton
So basically it's mechanisms for bridge building.
00:12:03:14 - 00:12:13:01
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes, yes. It's not a tool that is going to solve the conflict, but it's going to help you, together with other tools, to solve that specific conflict.
00:12:13:03 - 00:12:34:04
Abigail Acton
Great. Thank you. Thank you. Veronica, if we could just talk a little bit now about the Didimo project, which aims to allow people to generate a realistic, animated digital twin of themselves, it's very interesting to hear what your what you're up to. Having heard Salvador's description of of of how useful it is sometimes to adopt a different appearance.
00:12:34:06 - 00:12:39:15
Abigail Acton
Why did you feel it's needed for people to be able to do this to, to, to create a digital twin of themselves?
00:12:39:16 - 00:13:20:20
Veronica Orvalho
So, we created demo because we strongly believe that a new interaction model on how we communicate a person with a software or a person with a software on another person, it's it's really needed. Some somehow someone needs to create a new way on how people interact with computers. So we were able to take a selfie and then automatically upload that into the cloud and then create a digital twin of you, and I'll just tell a story, which I think is best exemplified in 2011, we created this experimental game for teaching kids with autism to draw and mimic facial expressions on a digital character.
00:13:20:22 - 00:13:40:20
Veronica Orvalho
And, we tested with many institutions and in one location, one of the kids with his dad was using the application, and after a while he started to smile. He suffered from very, very severe autism and at the end of the session, as a good researcher, you ask and we ask, we go, well, what are you going to do with it?
00:13:40:20 - 00:14:06:10
Veronica Orvalho
And he says, can I take the tablet with me? It was when tablets that just came out and I said, of course. And I say, well, what would you do? And, and what was remarkable about that day was that his dad said that he will use the tablet and the digital character to communicate with his son by drawing how he felt and being the digital character, the interface to communicate with his son.
00:14:06:12 - 00:14:26:07
Veronica Orvalho
So, that was many years ago, but it was kind of like the big moment, when I saw that that technology that was being built for film and games to create digital characters automatically so we can populate virtual worlds, suddenly it had, a much more meaningful,
00:14:26:09 - 00:14:29:16
Abigail Acton
Usage, wider usage, completely wider.
00:14:29:16 - 00:15:05:13
Veronica Orvalho
You did. And I felt very represented with Salvador because I participated in several European project where we use digital humans. As a way to study how you could increase empathy, in people that suffer from and stand for domestic violence problems. So you will do exactly what Sergio and Salvador was saying, which is you put yourself on the virtual body as the, as the, aggressor and then you would feel being the victim how people would, react with it.
00:15:05:15 - 00:15:30:12
Veronica Orvalho
But in any case, long story short, we we strongly believe that digital characters will be the new interaction model in the future, and you will be able to from trying on virtual garments and making good choices on how you want to look, to actually giving the possibility of someone that doesn't have a face or because they suffer an accident, or like Steve Hawking that could not speak.
00:15:30:17 - 00:15:49:11
Veronica Orvalho
We could actually create a digital representation of that person, and then suddenly that person can have a full, 3D representation and be inclusive in in the future of the internet, they can speak any language, so we can cross any barrier in terms of, language and culture.
00:15:49:12 - 00:16:07:15
Abigail Acton
It's almost as if the sky's the limit. It's just our imaginations which could hold us back and a bit the technology, which I'm sure Sergei is going to help us to, to understand. But I have one more question for you, Veronica. Before we do move on to Sergei. And that is, we talk about the avatars and we've talked about how children relate to the avatars.
00:16:07:17 - 00:16:26:03
Abigail Acton
Is there a danger for making avatars more realistic and and being able to be the ideal you, the you that you've always wanted to be, could, could kids and also, of course, adults find the whole process, more addictive. Could people end up trying to live their their best lives, as it were, online at some sort of dystopian future there?
00:16:26:03 - 00:16:26:22
Abigail Acton
But what do you think?
00:16:27:00 - 00:16:50:12
Veronica Orvalho
Oh, I mean, that's a very, very important question. Probably also, Salvador can comment more than me because I'm a geek technology person. But, I was having children and in the immersive was I think it's like with every technology, we really need to limit the amount of time we are online. And and understand that there's a difference between the physical and the real.
00:16:50:14 - 00:17:14:23
Veronica Orvalho
And I think it is on the hands of those that develop the technology that we think of the dual use of the technology and how we build the ethics embedded into the systems that we, create. And how can we, as the owners and creators of this technology, protect those that will be using it? Of course, we cannot prevent things that are going to happen.
00:17:15:00 - 00:17:19:17
Veronica Orvalho
But at least we can put all the mechanisms on alert and, possible.
00:17:19:20 - 00:17:35:15
Abigail Acton
Well, I have an extra question for Veronica. And that is, it sounds wonderful, but it's to me, in my mind, it's still a little theoretic. So how does this actually work? What does the project achieve practically? I mean, what could I do now in order to have a digital twin?
00:17:35:17 - 00:18:02:23
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah. So the way it works is you just take a photo of yourself with a mobile phone up, and it goes into an hour application, and then that it's uploaded into the cloud and it automatically generates a 3D character that is fully animatable that can speak, move. You can pretty much, if I will give an analogy, it's kind of like having your emoji or any animatable emoji, but with your photorealistic, digital human.
00:18:03:00 - 00:18:25:12
Veronica Orvalho
So what? We are a B2B type of business. So we focus on providing developers, the API and the toolkits and the SDK so companies can build the application they wish for. Now it's because this is so new. Yeah. People don't even know that this is possible. So they don't even know where they can use it and how.
00:18:25:17 - 00:18:48:05
Veronica Orvalho
So we're working closely with companies. So they include this technology as an additional element of their own. Going applications. But eventually, as you know, these people start getting used to and they understand that this is possible. Then consumers or end users will start having access to it and will use it in many different ways. I think where like an a very early beginning stage.
00:18:48:05 - 00:19:16:14
Abigail Acton
Sure, sure. It's like the same with all technology. It snowballs once it gets to sort of critical mass, it starts to be absolutely everywhere. Indeed. Thank you very much Veronica. So VRTogether wants to improve data capture, delivery and rendering to make domestic use of VR more photorealistic. Veronica was just talking about the whole notion of realism and yeah, I mean, my question to you is a little bit the same as I asked her if things get too realistic, is there not a danger people could lose themselves in a virtual reality concept?
00:19:16:14 - 00:19:17:20
Abigail Acton
What do you think, Sergio.
00:19:17:22 - 00:19:41:04
Sergi Fernandez
That make my answer to that would be yes and no. You can get lost in everything in your life. So? So it depends on the use, not the gift of technology. And in fact, it's it's not that real, let's say. I mean, I'm sure that that, Veronica's work is excellent. Actually, I was going to make a question, to her because.
00:19:41:10 - 00:20:09:00
Sergi Fernandez
Because, basically, if you can do that with one camera, that's something we could integrate already in our system. So for those use as without let's say that's cameras. And just with a webcam we can use your system and let's see mixing the technologies. We can animate these in a, let's say more realistic way. But in the end you may have, let's say Veronica approached the CGI avatars.
00:20:09:00 - 00:20:45:12
Sergi Fernandez
Somehow you capture reality and you create reality, and then you animate, an avatar that can be more or less realistic. And that's basically the problem that we saw. One of the problems that we saw for years ago when we started the project, because because by that time, let's say 360 wasn't the hype and people started to access virtual reality experiences in a more, in both professional and personal, situations.
00:20:45:14 - 00:21:18:10
Sergi Fernandez
And they missed, basically for meaningful interactions. They missed, the other person, not the other, another person or another group of people. Exactly. You were alone inside the virtual reality headset? That's one problem that the other problem is that it's difficult to insert you and your colleagues in a virtual environment in a realistic way. This is why you need sometimes to recreate the avatar and just animate the avatar, because you cannot put the real person there.
00:21:18:12 - 00:21:30:01
Sergi Fernandez
So that's basically why we try to solve, and the idea is to use a video, technologies and metric video technologies, real time to, did.
00:21:30:01 - 00:21:43:20
Abigail Acton
Did you feel that, that you're on the way to finding a solution for this and making things more realistic and more accessible? Because I know that in your heart what you want to do is democratize virtual reality, make it more accessible to people, make it perhaps less expensive. How is that looking?
00:21:43:20 - 00:22:19:18
Sergi Fernandez
It's it's progressing well, let's say good. Now we we have to developed a full end-to-end, like conferencing system. This other conferencing system includes avatars. Very simple ones, not Veronica's ones and, and and what we call, volumetric representations. And that's basically yourself being captured real time in 3D, of course, is the problem is that when you get into an immersive environment, normally you wear a headset or an mented reality headset or, virtual reality headset that are clumsy and so on.
00:22:19:20 - 00:22:44:03
Sergi Fernandez
So you cannot see, your colleagues eyes, the people with which you are inside, you cannot see the eyes and the facial expressions are very important. Now in in human communication, that's a prob a problem that is not solve neither for us, of course, because you have a headset that we cannot capture your eyes, nor for with our base because that's also, very difficult.
00:22:44:03 - 00:23:01:10
Abigail Acton
So sorry to say, but it begs the question, I mean, you're quite right. I mean, visual, visual expressions are very important. We're we're recording this, and we're just going to use the audio, but you all have your video on because it makes our conversation more dynamic. And and we can understand our, our matter language and our cues, because we can see each other.
00:23:01:14 - 00:23:10:11
Abigail Acton
What is the benefit than for hollow conferencing versus just a simple zoom conference like the one we're having in a way now? Why why why go virtual reality?
00:23:10:13 - 00:23:39:02
Sergi Fernandez
I said, if you want to do something together and really feel that you are together, it's difficult with a video conference. I mean, we can have a very meaningful interaction and we can, let's say, a change, data and information among us using zoom. That's okay. But if we together have to design something, for instance, and we have to think together, maybe the conferencing is not that good.
00:23:39:04 - 00:24:12:23
Sergi Fernandez
And definitely if we need to, let's say design something in the space or explore something or be trained together or, or even if, if, if I'm student and you are the teacher, and let's say there is a relevant role in the experience, that needs to be seen in a very realistic way. Videoconference is still, let's say it's great is the best that humanity deliver until the moment in terms of distant human communication.
00:24:13:00 - 00:24:18:10
Sergi Fernandez
But there is a long way to, to go. And that's, that's in the, in the pathway.
00:24:18:12 - 00:24:34:12
Abigail Acton
I mean, the point about training, I think is fascinating. One can see many, many applications, many scenarios in which the ability to, to work together to, to train people. I mean, I wonder whether it could be used for medicine and surgery and things like that.
00:24:34:14 - 00:24:42:18
Sergi Fernandez
A much, let's say a much, a more march in Spain would be mumble how you say more in English.
00:24:42:20 - 00:24:46:15
Abigail Acton
But really good idea to deliver to anyone. No, no, I don't know. Give give me more of a description.
00:24:46:17 - 00:24:48:09
Veronica Orvalho
Basic. Right.
00:24:48:11 - 00:24:50:04
Sergi Fernandez
But it's for the real world. Let's say.
00:24:50:09 - 00:24:52:06
Abigail Acton
A realistic,
00:24:52:08 - 00:24:53:19
Salvador Alvidrez
Ordinary, you know.
00:24:53:19 - 00:24:55:03
Abigail Acton
Ordinary.
00:24:55:05 - 00:24:57:16
Sergi Fernandez
Ordinary use case.
00:24:57:18 - 00:24:59:16
Abigail Acton
Collaborative. We're all being collaborative.
00:24:59:17 - 00:25:24:06
Sergi Fernandez
Yeah. Let's say I'm or simple use case would be basically, what we normally did before, the pandemic, we were in my office. My team is nine people, and we are all in a big table, and we see each other, behind the screens. We see each other so I can move my head and say, I look up, check these or, and you have these small talks.
00:25:24:08 - 00:25:48:12
Sergi Fernandez
That, again, is the glue of the company and now when we are distant, we spend hours and hours in video calls because this glue, this synchronization doesn't happen. That's one thing. If I could easily wear my headset and be in my office and see my partners there and they are home, I'm at home. Our interaction, current interaction will be much better while we are not in the office.
00:25:48:16 - 00:25:50:03
Abigail Acton
Yeah, I can see that.
00:25:50:05 - 00:26:11:15
Sergi Fernandez
And also you can do other types of things are not related to how users are present in space for instance, instead of having just one screen or two screens like like what I have now in the virtual environment, you can have as many screens as you want. So I don't even need to see other partners screen or ask him to share his screen.
00:26:11:17 - 00:26:44:20
Sergi Fernandez
Let's say occlude my screen to see my partner, the screen. I have all the space for all the screens, anyone and not, let's say there are some companies already testing that and using actually using that. But they don't use, let's say, the real representation of the users. They use avatars. So, where I processes, look, if we manage to do both things and with Veronica's technology, we can get, let's say users with simple webcams, also represented in a realistic way.
00:26:44:22 - 00:26:47:02
Sergi Fernandez
The way we work should be much more efficient.
00:26:47:04 - 00:26:52:20
Abigail Acton
Now, it's a completely new dimension, doesn't it? Anyone got any questions? Salvador, would you have a question?
00:26:52:22 - 00:27:16:18
Salvador Alvidrez
Yeah. No. I just, wanted to mention, I mean, in, in the same line to what, Sergi was saying, was explaining is that Mr. Reality has, the, the, the feature that provides context. And we need context, right? We need context to to make a, a whole picture of, what we are discussing, what we are seeing, what we are sharing.
00:27:16:20 - 00:27:41:21
Salvador Alvidrez
And that's why we use, for instance, emojis like, because sometimes it's difficult to make a, picture of a, the, the mood of this person I'm talking with, I'm talking to. Sorry. And, that's why they have to send, like, happy face or something like that. In virtual reality, you have more context, for bringing more, richer interaction.
00:27:41:23 - 00:27:44:20
Salvador Alvidrez
So to say that, yeah, yeah.
00:27:44:22 - 00:28:04:05
Abigail Acton
That's no, no no, but no, that's, that's that's good. That's that's true. I mean, clearly that's the case. But as, as Sergio was saying, you need the ability to actually have the representation of the, of the people concerned, in a realistic way, which is, which is perhaps Veronica's. Veronica's strengths and concept coming in. Very good.
00:28:04:08 - 00:28:14:15
Abigail Acton
Okay. That was very interesting. Does anyone have any questions to each other that you want to ask at all? Any anything still yet to raise or mention before I come to my final quick round question?
00:28:14:17 - 00:28:40:24
Salvador Alvidrez
Yeah. We just, very quick question to, Veronica. Well, I, I use all that, the website as well. And I think that that your work is, really fantastic. And, I guess, one question that you can share, a bit of information about, what is the, the most popular use that your clients are giving to, better realistic, hyper realistic avatars?
00:28:41:01 - 00:29:08:23
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah. So last year, we got a ton of people contacting us from fashion. So the fashion industry was really big, I think. And this is just my personal opinion, mostly because it was probably one of the industries that got very dramatically affected by the pandemic. So they needed to really, really fast find new ways on how they could still monetize, still keep their brands alive.
00:29:09:00 - 00:29:37:05
Veronica Orvalho
So, and it's all it was also an industry that needed kind of like a revive right on, on a new way. So, so fashion was really is one of the top, together with chat bots. So chat bots and, people wanted to have their own influencers. So there's like, no, like every other day we get a few, at least 1 or 2 requests that people that they want to create their own influencers and, and then gaming, gaming, it's always there.
00:29:37:05 - 00:29:52:11
Veronica Orvalho
But it's not where I think the technology that we're building will have the most impact, hopefully will be more on the areas of health care and education. That's where I hopefully see a few years from now the impact of the of what we're building.
00:29:52:13 - 00:29:57:22
Abigail Acton
But and the direction you'd like to go. And so you would you have a question for Veronica?
00:29:57:24 - 00:30:06:20
Sergi Fernandez
Yes. My first question is just to go through you do that. Let's say you do the reconstruction with one camera.
00:30:06:22 - 00:30:07:14
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah.
00:30:07:16 - 00:30:09:03
Sergi Fernandez
And what type of camera?
00:30:09:06 - 00:30:33:04
Veronica Orvalho
So we do with, like a mobile phone. So yeah, like, no need for, like, depth. Information either, so we can go with as simple as a simple selfie that you take with a mobile phone and we'll reconstruct everything else. So we do a lot of assumptions around the face, but we could input, the information like a selfie with depth, and that will be more accurate.
00:30:33:06 - 00:30:56:03
Veronica Orvalho
We could input, point cloud of a mobile phone and that would be more accurate. Or we can go all the way to photogrammetry data and you can just input, you know, 100 photos with like a canon camera, like very high resolution. And then we will get better results. So the pipeline that we have automated for the time being is the selfie.
00:30:56:07 - 00:31:14:10
Veronica Orvalho
So you take a photo and you upload it. We do have a 3D pipeline that we worked out with Sony. And we have a semi-automatic version of a photorealistic, like a photogrammetry, pipeline. But we aim for scalability, so it has to be automatic.
00:31:14:10 - 00:31:16:05
Abigail Acton
Yeah. So yeah, another question.
00:31:16:07 - 00:31:20:20
Sergi Fernandez
Yes. Do you animate real time your avatars or Husky?
00:31:20:22 - 00:31:42:21
Veronica Orvalho
That's an awesome question. That's a really great question. So we are we would be we've been pretty much in steel mode and doing partnerships. You know just polishing polishing the technology. And hopefully thanks to, you know, to the European grant next month, next month we will be launching the first version that allows for without webcam and the Or kit.
00:31:43:02 - 00:31:49:24
Veronica Orvalho
You create your Gmail like it's your digital character. And then with the mobile phone you can automatically animate it.
00:31:50:01 - 00:31:54:02
Abigail Acton
And that's fascinating. Veronika. Really? Honestly, that sounds so, so cutting edge.
00:31:54:04 - 00:32:01:03
Veronica Orvalho
I think like an add on text to speech. So you can actually type text and automatically animate the digital character.
00:32:01:04 - 00:32:28:03
Abigail Acton
And it comes out as a character speaking. That's fabulous. Thank you very much. That's that's super. Again, no, I mean, I see these things almost like a double edged sword in a way. The, the notion of the, the notion of the anonymity being a means to express, emotions that you maybe would like to put forward, but worried that your own group would think a two week or that you're you're not supporting your side aggressively enough?
00:32:28:05 - 00:32:44:07
Abigail Acton
Obviously this is a benefit of, of of being able to, to wear the clothing of someone else. But we all know from, from the internet what anonymity can also do. So I'm curious if I could ask each of you for for a brief answer here, but just on your gut instinct, I'm going to ask you one after the other.
00:32:44:07 - 00:32:53:23
Abigail Acton
I think I'll start this time with Sergi. Nice short answer. What do you think the challenges are that VR might bring? And how can we prepare the ground to mitigate those challenges?
00:32:54:00 - 00:33:05:05
Sergi Fernandez
I think the main stop for VR to become mainstream is the hardware and the quality of the image and the quality of the immersive sound.
00:33:05:07 - 00:33:06:21
Abigail Acton
Right. Excellent.
00:33:06:23 - 00:33:24:21
Sergi Fernandez
That's basically you think that's a problem there with the rest. Let's say the rest, somewhere people can solve it. But, the hardware, there are a lot of things that, let's say it's more than software. It's physics, it's electronics.
00:33:24:23 - 00:33:27:08
Abigail Acton
Yeah. So that's the bottleneck right now.
00:33:27:10 - 00:33:28:06
Sergi Fernandez
In my opinion.
00:33:28:08 - 00:33:47:11
Abigail Acton
Right. So that's that's one of the challenges that holds us back with regards to how we can actually get VR out there. But if we actually do get VR out there, question to Veronica. If it's something if it does become really widely available and very, very photorealistic and so on, what do you think that might be some of the societal challenges and how can we mitigate them?
00:33:47:13 - 00:34:03:03
Veronica Orvalho
The societal challenges. Oh, God. It's, the preservation of our identity. Right? I think is, you know, how can we protect who we are in, in the most authentic way. So I think GDPR, you know, has a lot to contribute to it.
00:34:03:08 - 00:34:06:13
Abigail Acton
So GDPR, the general data protection regulations.
00:34:06:15 - 00:34:34:24
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah, exactly. So again, you know, with, with the EU, we have awesome advisors in terms of the ethics. So we can embed in not just in our terms and conditions, which is the correct use of protecting our identity and the identity of the people. That is our software, but also training on our team. So when they are developing the software, they are responsible for what they're doing in terms of security.
00:34:35:01 - 00:34:43:11
Abigail Acton
Very good. Yeah, that's very interesting. Salvador, what challenges are there coming our way? Do you think if this really takes off and what can we do to mitigate those challenges?
00:34:43:13 - 00:35:07:03
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Pretty much as as Sergi and Veronica, we're saying, the first challenge is, hard work. I agree, because, you know, particularly our experiments, are not longer than they don't take longer than 30 minutes because after 30 minutes, you know, the, you know, the headset, they said it's very heavy and people start to get more and, remove it and so on.
00:35:07:05 - 00:35:39:21
Salvador Alvidrez
And, and also, as what else have Americans was saying? It's like, what does mean that, having a nightmare realistic avatar. Today in times of a phishing, it's like I want to there there are so many scams, out there when there are artificial intelligence, giving animation to your hyper realistic avatar so they can make a fake of you doing some kind of actions in some, point, and then, you know, they can, share it on YouTube, right?
00:35:40:02 - 00:36:11:21
Salvador Alvidrez
You know, the the risk of being, you know, that of, leak of or, security leak or whatever, that you out there can be taken or someone else can have access to your personal information. Well, is there, and, that's why I, I still trust and, mechanisms like, the GDPR and, and so because that's the last point of our defense for, for this kind of, shares, sorry.
00:36:12:00 - 00:36:44:02
Sergi Fernandez
No, no, I just I just wanted to let's support this, concept because let's say that the, the challenges in extended reality with regards to privacy and rights and, and ownership, is amazing because imagine I was discussing with a colleague today, I have a building, and now you can basically get a picture of my building and put on a reality thing there.
00:36:44:04 - 00:37:03:20
Sergi Fernandez
Imagine that you put something that I want to be seen on my building, even if it's in an application from a student. If you just do an application, it's no problem. But if it's Facebook and anyone can do whatever on the top of my building, not even a person, but even imagine if we are talking about persons that are on my.
00:37:03:22 - 00:37:26:18
Sergi Fernandez
They want to put something digital on my building and the building is my property. Why? Others have the right to put a digital thin layer on my building, because in the end, it's my not so papers that they say is mine. So that triggers a lot of trouble, a lot of, challenges. For instance, you cannot have cameras pointing to the street in Europe.
00:37:26:19 - 00:37:46:11
Sergi Fernandez
Now you need to have the cameras, security cameras pointing to your property. And but on the other way, you can take a cellphone and go in the street and record everything. So. So what are we going to do now with all these digital twins? Extended reality content is everywhere.
00:37:46:11 - 00:38:11:22
Abigail Acton
It's it's it sounds like what we really need to do is have another podcast on, you know, the, the open opening of the capacity to do more and more and how we actually assert our own rights to, to, to not be abused within that scenario. So, yeah, that that's a whole other conversation, I think. Very interesting. Absolutely. Veronica, do you want to add anything at all since we've been talking about hyperrealism and, and the possibility for abuse, do you have something to add to that?
00:38:11:23 - 00:38:39:01
Veronica Orvalho
I mean, yeah, I, I just have to say that each of us that develops and even uses are the ultimate responsibility of how the technology should be used, can be used and would impact those around us. So it doesn't really matter how much regulation there is out there. We all have to be responsible for what we do. How can we prevent the wrong use of it?
00:38:39:03 - 00:38:51:22
Veronica Orvalho
It's impossible once you put a technology like ours out there with an API that anyone can grab it. So it goes back to it's kind of like a cycle, right? Goes back to our own level of responsibility. Yes.
00:38:51:24 - 00:39:05:07
Abigail Acton
Yes. Well, thank you very, very much, all of you. For for that very interesting conversation, which, went well beyond the realms of just the technical into all sorts of moral philosophy and, and, and wider applications. That was fascinating. Thank you very much for your time.
00:39:05:08 - 00:39:07:12
Veronica Orvalho
Thank you for hearing it.
00:39:07:14 - 00:39:11:06
Sergi Fernandez
We need to put a project together, guys. So I'm going to send you an email.
00:39:11:08 - 00:39:13:04
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes.
00:39:13:06 - 00:39:14:04
Veronica Orvalho
Definitely.
00:39:14:04 - 00:39:19:07
Abigail Acton
not the first time this has happened. We get some nice synergies going between the guests quite often. I.
00:39:22:08 - 00:39:47:03
Abigail Acton
Do we? Are you interested in what other EU funded projects are doing in the virtual realm? Take a look at issue 103 of the research EU magazine available on the Cordis website Cordis Europa EU. Yeah. You can also find daily news articles and interviews with researchers working in a very broad range of domains, from archeology to zoology. If you are interested in scientific innovation, we'll have something to inspire you.
00:39:47:05 - 00:40:06:13
Abigail Acton
Results packs drill down deeper, gathering groups of projects by subject area, and the magazine offers insights into a different subject every month in its special section. Maybe you're involved in a project or would like to apply for funding. Take a look at what others are doing in your domain. So come and check out the research that's revealing what makes our world tick.
00:40:06:15 - 00:40:25:00
Abigail Acton
Our next episode explores the final frontier space. Join me on a trip to the stars. We're always happy to hear from you. So drop us a line editorial@cordis.europa.eu. Until next time.
This is an AI transcription.
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:32:23
Abigail Acton
This is CORDIScovery .Hello. This is CORDIScovery, and I'm Abigail Acton. Today we will be exploring the reality of virtual reality. Is there a headset heading your way or are the cast and the relatively limited content going to hold back uptake for yet a while? Digital communication has flourished for many of us during the pandemic.
00:00:33:03 - 00:00:53:11
Abigail Acton
We've accepted, indeed welcomed what might have been novel methods of contact for many of us. So are we now hungry for the next evolution in digital communications? Is there a virtual reality revolution around the corner? If so, how can the technology be applied? Will VR be just another bone of contention between screen addicted adolescents and their frazzled parents?
00:00:53:13 - 00:01:17:11
Abigail Acton
Or can the inherent characteristics of virtual reality communicating at a distance? But in a space that feels intimate, be harnessed to really revolutionize the way we interact? My guests today, who have been supported by the EU's horizon 2020 program, may be able to tell us virtual reality avatars, digital representations of ourselves, a way to foster empathy or yet another medium providing a cloak of anonymity that can be abused.
00:01:17:13 - 00:01:38:09
Abigail Acton
A very warm. Welcome to Doctor Salvador Alvidrez Marie Curie, research fellow at Queen's University Belfast. Salvador is interested in the socio psychological effects of communication technologies. He is the principal investigator of the ContactVIRT project, which is looking into the use of virtual reality for reducing sectarian prejudice. Hello Salvador.
00:01:38:14 - 00:01:40:00
Salvador Alvidrez
Hi. Thank you Abigail.
00:01:40:02 - 00:02:01:03
Abigail Acton
Co-Ordinator of the Didymos Project. Doctor Veronica Orvalho is fascinated by the ways in which people communicate and share knowledge. She has used her engineering and research backgrounds to create the Didimo Company, which has patented technology to generate digital humans. Veronica's inventions have been used by Microsoft, universal, Sony and others. Welcome, Veronica.
00:02:01:05 - 00:02:02:00
Veronica Orvalho
Hello.
00:02:02:02 - 00:02:18:19
Abigail Acton
Sergi Fernandez director of the media and internet unit at IT CAT is a computer engineer and researcher. Sergi’s background is in natural language processing and he has recently been focusing on immersive and interactive systems. He was the VRTogether project co-ordinator. Welcome, Sergey.
00:02:18:21 - 00:02:21:06
Sergi Fernandez
Hi, Abigail. It's a pleasure.
00:02:21:08 - 00:02:37:01
Abigail Acton
Salvador, I have a couple of questions for you. Believe it or not, the ContactVIRT Project has been exploring how virtual reality can be used to bring divided communities closer together. Can I ask you, how did you first get interested in the way that technology affects our communication?
00:02:37:03 - 00:03:01:20
Salvador Alvidrez
Well, I guess that these all started many years ago when the, you know, the text messaging feature Western first introducing mobile phones. So we are talking about many years ago. I was intrigued, about how sometimes it's easier to de-escalate conflicts just by using text messages. I mean, in contrast to, trying to solve it, face to face, in which sometimes you make it worse.
00:03:01:21 - 00:03:24:09
Salvador Alvidrez
I actually, I, I was also intrigued by, how, sometimes it's also easier to, to make social phones with people that otherwise, you know, in real life and face to face, interaction is, kind of difficult. So, communication technologies can actually be useful tools for reducing conflict and, improving social relationships.
00:03:24:12 - 00:03:31:05
Abigail Acton
Very interesting. And which areas are you particularly interested in looking at at the moment? What what are you studying at the moment for this?
00:03:31:07 - 00:04:05:02
Salvador Alvidrez
I'm working particularly with the impression information, line of research. So, for instance, in VR, I'm working about how to, put certain elements in the virtual environment, affect the way in which, users identify with, social category and thus, the whole elements associated to, these categories, such as, for instance, I can see, you know, this, former enemy as a part of my new group online.
00:04:05:04 - 00:04:08:18
Salvador Alvidrez
So, that's, that's out of line of research currently.
00:04:08:21 - 00:04:16:24
Abigail Acton
Okay, fascinating. We've got used to digital conferencing tools which bring people together at a safe distance. So what's the additional benefit of VR?
00:04:17:01 - 00:04:40:14
Salvador Alvidrez
I think that the main difference is the illusion of presence. Because, for instance, in two meetings, people are conscious that conversations are constrained only by, what you see in the, in the screen frame. In virtual reality, users actually move in a three dimensional space in which, they interact and feel as if they are present in that environment.
00:04:40:16 - 00:05:07:00
Salvador Alvidrez
This illusion is closer to what our senses interpret as, reality. So, making social interactions more vivid. Of course, interactions always depend, upon the state of their relationships offline because it's, it's not the same having interaction with someone that you already know, someone that you consider a friend or someone that you consider an enemy.
00:05:07:05 - 00:05:07:11
Salvador Alvidrez
Right.
00:05:07:14 - 00:05:20:00
Abigail Acton
And, your research, I mean, that's very true. And it's interesting, but what I'm curious to know, then when when you actually put people together to see how this worked out in practice, can I ask you who who your subjects were and what did you find?
00:05:20:02 - 00:05:46:17
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes, I, I ran this, this previous study, in, in the US, some years ago. And, and by that time, I was interested on how to use PR for reducing, prejudice towards ethnic minorities. I used for only students because most of the time I use, experimental study. So I use a students who volunteers, they customize, their avatars.
00:05:46:17 - 00:06:22:24
Salvador Alvidrez
They were asked to customize their avatars to either look like, themselves. I mean, their physical traits, skin color and so on, or to look like someone totally different from them. And, this was just before having the interaction with the person of the minority. And, our findings, were really interesting because, apparently, they, they felt more confident and, prejudice was reducing the conditions in which they, were so to say, anonymous, because they, they were looking like someone different from them.
00:06:23:01 - 00:06:39:15
Salvador Alvidrez
And, I think that, you know, they, they, they, removed this, social pressure or of, feeling accountable when they are having an interaction, even if, this is only an avatar based interaction.
00:06:39:16 - 00:07:03:11
Abigail Acton
No. That's fascinating. And perhaps also it relieves the pressure of having to appear to support the group that you belong to, even if the group that you belong to might have feelings or believes that you find perhaps too extreme or too strong, but you feel that you're obliged to go along with the crowd. Whereas if you have the anonymity of an avatar, maybe you can actually express a more moderate position without fearing that people are going to condemn you from your own group.
00:07:03:11 - 00:07:04:13
Abigail Acton
Is that something you found?
00:07:04:14 - 00:07:28:22
Salvador Alvidrez
Certainly, certainly. For instance, there's a this, line of research in which, the clothes you're using with your avatar sometimes influence the pictures you have about yourself. So for instance, if, people are, using, black, ropes or black dresses tend to be more, aggressive than, people wearing avatars in white clothes.
00:07:28:22 - 00:07:51:09
Salvador Alvidrez
And that's because they are internalizing, well, a series of, associations with the colors and so on. So, the same happens with people playing with, this kind of identity. So, if I am seeing, like a member of this group who might be very prejudiced and I change my features to look like someone that doesn't belong to that group.
00:07:51:09 - 00:07:55:13
Salvador Alvidrez
Yeah, that that might improve, you know, the the the interaction, actually.
00:07:55:13 - 00:08:09:09
Abigail Acton
That's very interesting. It's a little bit like putting prisoners in pink overalls and stuff like that to mitigate violence and stuff. Does anyone have any questions for Salvador? I think this is fascinating. Veronica. Maybe. Perhaps you too, because you're interested in the notion of avatars in the demo.
00:08:09:11 - 00:08:38:11
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah, definitely. It's, It's fascinating. Salvador, what you've just shared. I was actually wondering when you mentioned about the accountability of actually seeing yourself or not seeing yourself on the virtual space. How do you think about the responsibility concept? I so if I, if I actually see myself in a virtual world, I need to really need like how does responsibility changes if I don't see myself and I see someone else that I control?
00:08:38:13 - 00:08:41:21
Salvador Alvidrez
You mean in terms of, like, self constraining?
00:08:41:22 - 00:09:05:06
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah, definitely. Like if I see myself when I post a picture of myself on, on a social media, I would be more careful of what I do because it's actually my image, my faith, my body. I wonder in your experiments or experiences that you've done, if you've found any correlation in terms of responsibility with seeing yourself in the virtual world, does that make sense?
00:09:05:07 - 00:09:33:18
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Of course. For instance, the the site model. Wow. That's a I'm not going to be too into, very theoretical terms. So basically when do you feel accountable, do you feel like I committed, once I that you are, in, in in, in the better world, you feel committed to hold these, personality because it's not only when you think about yourself, it's also what you think the others are thinking about.
00:09:33:18 - 00:10:11:13
Salvador Alvidrez
Or aspect about yourself in terms of, of your physical appearance. And, you know, this is very interesting because, for instance, with this, a new, line of research, for, perspective taking, they ask people to, to embody avatars belonging to different, to stigmatized social groups. I mean, in order to put in the shoes of other person and, these, instills empathy, and, and this is all based on the self-perception of, of being in the shoes of, of of a member of a stigmatized group.
00:10:11:15 - 00:10:33:13
Salvador Alvidrez
Now, you have to imagine that, this kind of effect, it was not found on people that look like themselves. I mean, to the group, they belong. So, yes, there's a commitment. Once you are identifiable, we call it that accountability because you are accountable in terms of now in terms of, responsibility to for your actions.
00:10:33:13 - 00:10:42:20
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Somehow you are responsible, but only in terms of what you think, the others are expecting from you.
00:10:42:22 - 00:10:46:18
Abigail Acton
Any other questions at all? Sergi Yes, please.
00:10:46:20 - 00:11:10:15
Sergi Fernandez
Yes. Salvador, thank you for your explanations. Which use cases, I mean, let's say which conflicts examples. Can you explain us and then also which are the difficulties that you find when, you try to scale these into certain conflicts? Let's say the conflict itself makes this interaction impossible.
00:11:10:17 - 00:11:52:24
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Of course. Thank you for the question. It's very interesting. That goes, for instance, obviously, when the, the level of conflict is, you know, they've reached a point in which, nobody wants to have any kind of interaction at all. Not in person, neither in the, in a virtual environment. And so, these kind of, tools, actually don't, won't work, but you can use it as a tool, together with other, strategies, you can use technological tools like VR or, text messaging or having, a friend of a friend who is, friend of that group and so on.
00:11:52:24 - 00:12:00:22
Salvador Alvidrez
But you have to increase, the number of, social cues, so to say, before having a face to face interaction.
00:12:00:24 - 00:12:03:12
Abigail Acton
So basically it's mechanisms for bridge building.
00:12:03:14 - 00:12:13:01
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes, yes. It's not a tool that is going to solve the conflict, but it's going to help you, together with other tools, to solve that specific conflict.
00:12:13:03 - 00:12:34:04
Abigail Acton
Great. Thank you. Thank you. Veronica, if we could just talk a little bit now about the Didimo project, which aims to allow people to generate a realistic, animated digital twin of themselves, it's very interesting to hear what your what you're up to. Having heard Salvador's description of of of how useful it is sometimes to adopt a different appearance.
00:12:34:06 - 00:12:39:15
Abigail Acton
Why did you feel it's needed for people to be able to do this to, to, to create a digital twin of themselves?
00:12:39:16 - 00:13:20:20
Veronica Orvalho
So, we created demo because we strongly believe that a new interaction model on how we communicate a person with a software or a person with a software on another person, it's it's really needed. Some somehow someone needs to create a new way on how people interact with computers. So we were able to take a selfie and then automatically upload that into the cloud and then create a digital twin of you, and I'll just tell a story, which I think is best exemplified in 2011, we created this experimental game for teaching kids with autism to draw and mimic facial expressions on a digital character.
00:13:20:22 - 00:13:40:20
Veronica Orvalho
And, we tested with many institutions and in one location, one of the kids with his dad was using the application, and after a while he started to smile. He suffered from very, very severe autism and at the end of the session, as a good researcher, you ask and we ask, we go, well, what are you going to do with it?
00:13:40:20 - 00:14:06:10
Veronica Orvalho
And he says, can I take the tablet with me? It was when tablets that just came out and I said, of course. And I say, well, what would you do? And, and what was remarkable about that day was that his dad said that he will use the tablet and the digital character to communicate with his son by drawing how he felt and being the digital character, the interface to communicate with his son.
00:14:06:12 - 00:14:26:07
Veronica Orvalho
So, that was many years ago, but it was kind of like the big moment, when I saw that that technology that was being built for film and games to create digital characters automatically so we can populate virtual worlds, suddenly it had, a much more meaningful,
00:14:26:09 - 00:14:29:16
Abigail Acton
Usage, wider usage, completely wider.
00:14:29:16 - 00:15:05:13
Veronica Orvalho
You did. And I felt very represented with Salvador because I participated in several European project where we use digital humans. As a way to study how you could increase empathy, in people that suffer from and stand for domestic violence problems. So you will do exactly what Sergio and Salvador was saying, which is you put yourself on the virtual body as the, as the, aggressor and then you would feel being the victim how people would, react with it.
00:15:05:15 - 00:15:30:12
Veronica Orvalho
But in any case, long story short, we we strongly believe that digital characters will be the new interaction model in the future, and you will be able to from trying on virtual garments and making good choices on how you want to look, to actually giving the possibility of someone that doesn't have a face or because they suffer an accident, or like Steve Hawking that could not speak.
00:15:30:17 - 00:15:49:11
Veronica Orvalho
We could actually create a digital representation of that person, and then suddenly that person can have a full, 3D representation and be inclusive in in the future of the internet, they can speak any language, so we can cross any barrier in terms of, language and culture.
00:15:49:12 - 00:16:07:15
Abigail Acton
It's almost as if the sky's the limit. It's just our imaginations which could hold us back and a bit the technology, which I'm sure Sergei is going to help us to, to understand. But I have one more question for you, Veronica. Before we do move on to Sergei. And that is, we talk about the avatars and we've talked about how children relate to the avatars.
00:16:07:17 - 00:16:26:03
Abigail Acton
Is there a danger for making avatars more realistic and and being able to be the ideal you, the you that you've always wanted to be, could, could kids and also, of course, adults find the whole process, more addictive. Could people end up trying to live their their best lives, as it were, online at some sort of dystopian future there?
00:16:26:03 - 00:16:26:22
Abigail Acton
But what do you think?
00:16:27:00 - 00:16:50:12
Veronica Orvalho
Oh, I mean, that's a very, very important question. Probably also, Salvador can comment more than me because I'm a geek technology person. But, I was having children and in the immersive was I think it's like with every technology, we really need to limit the amount of time we are online. And and understand that there's a difference between the physical and the real.
00:16:50:14 - 00:17:14:23
Veronica Orvalho
And I think it is on the hands of those that develop the technology that we think of the dual use of the technology and how we build the ethics embedded into the systems that we, create. And how can we, as the owners and creators of this technology, protect those that will be using it? Of course, we cannot prevent things that are going to happen.
00:17:15:00 - 00:17:19:17
Veronica Orvalho
But at least we can put all the mechanisms on alert and, possible.
00:17:19:20 - 00:17:35:15
Abigail Acton
Well, I have an extra question for Veronica. And that is, it sounds wonderful, but it's to me, in my mind, it's still a little theoretic. So how does this actually work? What does the project achieve practically? I mean, what could I do now in order to have a digital twin?
00:17:35:17 - 00:18:02:23
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah. So the way it works is you just take a photo of yourself with a mobile phone up, and it goes into an hour application, and then that it's uploaded into the cloud and it automatically generates a 3D character that is fully animatable that can speak, move. You can pretty much, if I will give an analogy, it's kind of like having your emoji or any animatable emoji, but with your photorealistic, digital human.
00:18:03:00 - 00:18:25:12
Veronica Orvalho
So what? We are a B2B type of business. So we focus on providing developers, the API and the toolkits and the SDK so companies can build the application they wish for. Now it's because this is so new. Yeah. People don't even know that this is possible. So they don't even know where they can use it and how.
00:18:25:17 - 00:18:48:05
Veronica Orvalho
So we're working closely with companies. So they include this technology as an additional element of their own. Going applications. But eventually, as you know, these people start getting used to and they understand that this is possible. Then consumers or end users will start having access to it and will use it in many different ways. I think where like an a very early beginning stage.
00:18:48:05 - 00:19:16:14
Abigail Acton
Sure, sure. It's like the same with all technology. It snowballs once it gets to sort of critical mass, it starts to be absolutely everywhere. Indeed. Thank you very much Veronica. So VRTogether wants to improve data capture, delivery and rendering to make domestic use of VR more photorealistic. Veronica was just talking about the whole notion of realism and yeah, I mean, my question to you is a little bit the same as I asked her if things get too realistic, is there not a danger people could lose themselves in a virtual reality concept?
00:19:16:14 - 00:19:17:20
Abigail Acton
What do you think, Sergio.
00:19:17:22 - 00:19:41:04
Sergi Fernandez
That make my answer to that would be yes and no. You can get lost in everything in your life. So? So it depends on the use, not the gift of technology. And in fact, it's it's not that real, let's say. I mean, I'm sure that that, Veronica's work is excellent. Actually, I was going to make a question, to her because.
00:19:41:10 - 00:20:09:00
Sergi Fernandez
Because, basically, if you can do that with one camera, that's something we could integrate already in our system. So for those use as without let's say that's cameras. And just with a webcam we can use your system and let's see mixing the technologies. We can animate these in a, let's say more realistic way. But in the end you may have, let's say Veronica approached the CGI avatars.
00:20:09:00 - 00:20:45:12
Sergi Fernandez
Somehow you capture reality and you create reality, and then you animate, an avatar that can be more or less realistic. And that's basically the problem that we saw. One of the problems that we saw for years ago when we started the project, because because by that time, let's say 360 wasn't the hype and people started to access virtual reality experiences in a more, in both professional and personal, situations.
00:20:45:14 - 00:21:18:10
Sergi Fernandez
And they missed, basically for meaningful interactions. They missed, the other person, not the other, another person or another group of people. Exactly. You were alone inside the virtual reality headset? That's one problem that the other problem is that it's difficult to insert you and your colleagues in a virtual environment in a realistic way. This is why you need sometimes to recreate the avatar and just animate the avatar, because you cannot put the real person there.
00:21:18:12 - 00:21:30:01
Sergi Fernandez
So that's basically why we try to solve, and the idea is to use a video, technologies and metric video technologies, real time to, did.
00:21:30:01 - 00:21:43:20
Abigail Acton
Did you feel that, that you're on the way to finding a solution for this and making things more realistic and more accessible? Because I know that in your heart what you want to do is democratize virtual reality, make it more accessible to people, make it perhaps less expensive. How is that looking?
00:21:43:20 - 00:22:19:18
Sergi Fernandez
It's it's progressing well, let's say good. Now we we have to developed a full end-to-end, like conferencing system. This other conferencing system includes avatars. Very simple ones, not Veronica's ones and, and and what we call, volumetric representations. And that's basically yourself being captured real time in 3D, of course, is the problem is that when you get into an immersive environment, normally you wear a headset or an mented reality headset or, virtual reality headset that are clumsy and so on.
00:22:19:20 - 00:22:44:03
Sergi Fernandez
So you cannot see, your colleagues eyes, the people with which you are inside, you cannot see the eyes and the facial expressions are very important. Now in in human communication, that's a prob a problem that is not solve neither for us, of course, because you have a headset that we cannot capture your eyes, nor for with our base because that's also, very difficult.
00:22:44:03 - 00:23:01:10
Abigail Acton
So sorry to say, but it begs the question, I mean, you're quite right. I mean, visual, visual expressions are very important. We're we're recording this, and we're just going to use the audio, but you all have your video on because it makes our conversation more dynamic. And and we can understand our, our matter language and our cues, because we can see each other.
00:23:01:14 - 00:23:10:11
Abigail Acton
What is the benefit than for hollow conferencing versus just a simple zoom conference like the one we're having in a way now? Why why why go virtual reality?
00:23:10:13 - 00:23:39:02
Sergi Fernandez
I said, if you want to do something together and really feel that you are together, it's difficult with a video conference. I mean, we can have a very meaningful interaction and we can, let's say, a change, data and information among us using zoom. That's okay. But if we together have to design something, for instance, and we have to think together, maybe the conferencing is not that good.
00:23:39:04 - 00:24:12:23
Sergi Fernandez
And definitely if we need to, let's say design something in the space or explore something or be trained together or, or even if, if, if I'm student and you are the teacher, and let's say there is a relevant role in the experience, that needs to be seen in a very realistic way. Videoconference is still, let's say it's great is the best that humanity deliver until the moment in terms of distant human communication.
00:24:13:00 - 00:24:18:10
Sergi Fernandez
But there is a long way to, to go. And that's, that's in the, in the pathway.
00:24:18:12 - 00:24:34:12
Abigail Acton
I mean, the point about training, I think is fascinating. One can see many, many applications, many scenarios in which the ability to, to work together to, to train people. I mean, I wonder whether it could be used for medicine and surgery and things like that.
00:24:34:14 - 00:24:42:18
Sergi Fernandez
A much, let's say a much, a more march in Spain would be mumble how you say more in English.
00:24:42:20 - 00:24:46:15
Abigail Acton
But really good idea to deliver to anyone. No, no, I don't know. Give give me more of a description.
00:24:46:17 - 00:24:48:09
Veronica Orvalho
Basic. Right.
00:24:48:11 - 00:24:50:04
Sergi Fernandez
But it's for the real world. Let's say.
00:24:50:09 - 00:24:52:06
Abigail Acton
A realistic,
00:24:52:08 - 00:24:53:19
Salvador Alvidrez
Ordinary, you know.
00:24:53:19 - 00:24:55:03
Abigail Acton
Ordinary.
00:24:55:05 - 00:24:57:16
Sergi Fernandez
Ordinary use case.
00:24:57:18 - 00:24:59:16
Abigail Acton
Collaborative. We're all being collaborative.
00:24:59:17 - 00:25:24:06
Sergi Fernandez
Yeah. Let's say I'm or simple use case would be basically, what we normally did before, the pandemic, we were in my office. My team is nine people, and we are all in a big table, and we see each other, behind the screens. We see each other so I can move my head and say, I look up, check these or, and you have these small talks.
00:25:24:08 - 00:25:48:12
Sergi Fernandez
That, again, is the glue of the company and now when we are distant, we spend hours and hours in video calls because this glue, this synchronization doesn't happen. That's one thing. If I could easily wear my headset and be in my office and see my partners there and they are home, I'm at home. Our interaction, current interaction will be much better while we are not in the office.
00:25:48:16 - 00:25:50:03
Abigail Acton
Yeah, I can see that.
00:25:50:05 - 00:26:11:15
Sergi Fernandez
And also you can do other types of things are not related to how users are present in space for instance, instead of having just one screen or two screens like like what I have now in the virtual environment, you can have as many screens as you want. So I don't even need to see other partners screen or ask him to share his screen.
00:26:11:17 - 00:26:44:20
Sergi Fernandez
Let's say occlude my screen to see my partner, the screen. I have all the space for all the screens, anyone and not, let's say there are some companies already testing that and using actually using that. But they don't use, let's say, the real representation of the users. They use avatars. So, where I processes, look, if we manage to do both things and with Veronica's technology, we can get, let's say users with simple webcams, also represented in a realistic way.
00:26:44:22 - 00:26:47:02
Sergi Fernandez
The way we work should be much more efficient.
00:26:47:04 - 00:26:52:20
Abigail Acton
Now, it's a completely new dimension, doesn't it? Anyone got any questions? Salvador, would you have a question?
00:26:52:22 - 00:27:16:18
Salvador Alvidrez
Yeah. No. I just, wanted to mention, I mean, in, in the same line to what, Sergi was saying, was explaining is that Mr. Reality has, the, the, the feature that provides context. And we need context, right? We need context to to make a, a whole picture of, what we are discussing, what we are seeing, what we are sharing.
00:27:16:20 - 00:27:41:21
Salvador Alvidrez
And that's why we use, for instance, emojis like, because sometimes it's difficult to make a, picture of a, the, the mood of this person I'm talking with, I'm talking to. Sorry. And, that's why they have to send, like, happy face or something like that. In virtual reality, you have more context, for bringing more, richer interaction.
00:27:41:23 - 00:27:44:20
Salvador Alvidrez
So to say that, yeah, yeah.
00:27:44:22 - 00:28:04:05
Abigail Acton
That's no, no no, but no, that's, that's that's good. That's that's true. I mean, clearly that's the case. But as, as Sergio was saying, you need the ability to actually have the representation of the, of the people concerned, in a realistic way, which is, which is perhaps Veronica's. Veronica's strengths and concept coming in. Very good.
00:28:04:08 - 00:28:14:15
Abigail Acton
Okay. That was very interesting. Does anyone have any questions to each other that you want to ask at all? Any anything still yet to raise or mention before I come to my final quick round question?
00:28:14:17 - 00:28:40:24
Salvador Alvidrez
Yeah. We just, very quick question to, Veronica. Well, I, I use all that, the website as well. And I think that that your work is, really fantastic. And, I guess, one question that you can share, a bit of information about, what is the, the most popular use that your clients are giving to, better realistic, hyper realistic avatars?
00:28:41:01 - 00:29:08:23
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah. So last year, we got a ton of people contacting us from fashion. So the fashion industry was really big, I think. And this is just my personal opinion, mostly because it was probably one of the industries that got very dramatically affected by the pandemic. So they needed to really, really fast find new ways on how they could still monetize, still keep their brands alive.
00:29:09:00 - 00:29:37:05
Veronica Orvalho
So, and it's all it was also an industry that needed kind of like a revive right on, on a new way. So, so fashion was really is one of the top, together with chat bots. So chat bots and, people wanted to have their own influencers. So there's like, no, like every other day we get a few, at least 1 or 2 requests that people that they want to create their own influencers and, and then gaming, gaming, it's always there.
00:29:37:05 - 00:29:52:11
Veronica Orvalho
But it's not where I think the technology that we're building will have the most impact, hopefully will be more on the areas of health care and education. That's where I hopefully see a few years from now the impact of the of what we're building.
00:29:52:13 - 00:29:57:22
Abigail Acton
But and the direction you'd like to go. And so you would you have a question for Veronica?
00:29:57:24 - 00:30:06:20
Sergi Fernandez
Yes. My first question is just to go through you do that. Let's say you do the reconstruction with one camera.
00:30:06:22 - 00:30:07:14
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah.
00:30:07:16 - 00:30:09:03
Sergi Fernandez
And what type of camera?
00:30:09:06 - 00:30:33:04
Veronica Orvalho
So we do with, like a mobile phone. So yeah, like, no need for, like, depth. Information either, so we can go with as simple as a simple selfie that you take with a mobile phone and we'll reconstruct everything else. So we do a lot of assumptions around the face, but we could input, the information like a selfie with depth, and that will be more accurate.
00:30:33:06 - 00:30:56:03
Veronica Orvalho
We could input, point cloud of a mobile phone and that would be more accurate. Or we can go all the way to photogrammetry data and you can just input, you know, 100 photos with like a canon camera, like very high resolution. And then we will get better results. So the pipeline that we have automated for the time being is the selfie.
00:30:56:07 - 00:31:14:10
Veronica Orvalho
So you take a photo and you upload it. We do have a 3D pipeline that we worked out with Sony. And we have a semi-automatic version of a photorealistic, like a photogrammetry, pipeline. But we aim for scalability, so it has to be automatic.
00:31:14:10 - 00:31:16:05
Abigail Acton
Yeah. So yeah, another question.
00:31:16:07 - 00:31:20:20
Sergi Fernandez
Yes. Do you animate real time your avatars or Husky?
00:31:20:22 - 00:31:42:21
Veronica Orvalho
That's an awesome question. That's a really great question. So we are we would be we've been pretty much in steel mode and doing partnerships. You know just polishing polishing the technology. And hopefully thanks to, you know, to the European grant next month, next month we will be launching the first version that allows for without webcam and the Or kit.
00:31:43:02 - 00:31:49:24
Veronica Orvalho
You create your Gmail like it's your digital character. And then with the mobile phone you can automatically animate it.
00:31:50:01 - 00:31:54:02
Abigail Acton
And that's fascinating. Veronika. Really? Honestly, that sounds so, so cutting edge.
00:31:54:04 - 00:32:01:03
Veronica Orvalho
I think like an add on text to speech. So you can actually type text and automatically animate the digital character.
00:32:01:04 - 00:32:28:03
Abigail Acton
And it comes out as a character speaking. That's fabulous. Thank you very much. That's that's super. Again, no, I mean, I see these things almost like a double edged sword in a way. The, the notion of the, the notion of the anonymity being a means to express, emotions that you maybe would like to put forward, but worried that your own group would think a two week or that you're you're not supporting your side aggressively enough?
00:32:28:05 - 00:32:44:07
Abigail Acton
Obviously this is a benefit of, of of being able to, to wear the clothing of someone else. But we all know from, from the internet what anonymity can also do. So I'm curious if I could ask each of you for for a brief answer here, but just on your gut instinct, I'm going to ask you one after the other.
00:32:44:07 - 00:32:53:23
Abigail Acton
I think I'll start this time with Sergi. Nice short answer. What do you think the challenges are that VR might bring? And how can we prepare the ground to mitigate those challenges?
00:32:54:00 - 00:33:05:05
Sergi Fernandez
I think the main stop for VR to become mainstream is the hardware and the quality of the image and the quality of the immersive sound.
00:33:05:07 - 00:33:06:21
Abigail Acton
Right. Excellent.
00:33:06:23 - 00:33:24:21
Sergi Fernandez
That's basically you think that's a problem there with the rest. Let's say the rest, somewhere people can solve it. But, the hardware, there are a lot of things that, let's say it's more than software. It's physics, it's electronics.
00:33:24:23 - 00:33:27:08
Abigail Acton
Yeah. So that's the bottleneck right now.
00:33:27:10 - 00:33:28:06
Sergi Fernandez
In my opinion.
00:33:28:08 - 00:33:47:11
Abigail Acton
Right. So that's that's one of the challenges that holds us back with regards to how we can actually get VR out there. But if we actually do get VR out there, question to Veronica. If it's something if it does become really widely available and very, very photorealistic and so on, what do you think that might be some of the societal challenges and how can we mitigate them?
00:33:47:13 - 00:34:03:03
Veronica Orvalho
The societal challenges. Oh, God. It's, the preservation of our identity. Right? I think is, you know, how can we protect who we are in, in the most authentic way. So I think GDPR, you know, has a lot to contribute to it.
00:34:03:08 - 00:34:06:13
Abigail Acton
So GDPR, the general data protection regulations.
00:34:06:15 - 00:34:34:24
Veronica Orvalho
Yeah, exactly. So again, you know, with, with the EU, we have awesome advisors in terms of the ethics. So we can embed in not just in our terms and conditions, which is the correct use of protecting our identity and the identity of the people. That is our software, but also training on our team. So when they are developing the software, they are responsible for what they're doing in terms of security.
00:34:35:01 - 00:34:43:11
Abigail Acton
Very good. Yeah, that's very interesting. Salvador, what challenges are there coming our way? Do you think if this really takes off and what can we do to mitigate those challenges?
00:34:43:13 - 00:35:07:03
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes. Pretty much as as Sergi and Veronica, we're saying, the first challenge is, hard work. I agree, because, you know, particularly our experiments, are not longer than they don't take longer than 30 minutes because after 30 minutes, you know, the, you know, the headset, they said it's very heavy and people start to get more and, remove it and so on.
00:35:07:05 - 00:35:39:21
Salvador Alvidrez
And, and also, as what else have Americans was saying? It's like, what does mean that, having a nightmare realistic avatar. Today in times of a phishing, it's like I want to there there are so many scams, out there when there are artificial intelligence, giving animation to your hyper realistic avatar so they can make a fake of you doing some kind of actions in some, point, and then, you know, they can, share it on YouTube, right?
00:35:40:02 - 00:36:11:21
Salvador Alvidrez
You know, the the risk of being, you know, that of, leak of or, security leak or whatever, that you out there can be taken or someone else can have access to your personal information. Well, is there, and, that's why I, I still trust and, mechanisms like, the GDPR and, and so because that's the last point of our defense for, for this kind of, shares, sorry.
00:36:12:00 - 00:36:44:02
Sergi Fernandez
No, no, I just I just wanted to let's support this, concept because let's say that the, the challenges in extended reality with regards to privacy and rights and, and ownership, is amazing because imagine I was discussing with a colleague today, I have a building, and now you can basically get a picture of my building and put on a reality thing there.
00:36:44:04 - 00:37:03:20
Sergi Fernandez
Imagine that you put something that I want to be seen on my building, even if it's in an application from a student. If you just do an application, it's no problem. But if it's Facebook and anyone can do whatever on the top of my building, not even a person, but even imagine if we are talking about persons that are on my.
00:37:03:22 - 00:37:26:18
Sergi Fernandez
They want to put something digital on my building and the building is my property. Why? Others have the right to put a digital thin layer on my building, because in the end, it's my not so papers that they say is mine. So that triggers a lot of trouble, a lot of, challenges. For instance, you cannot have cameras pointing to the street in Europe.
00:37:26:19 - 00:37:46:11
Sergi Fernandez
Now you need to have the cameras, security cameras pointing to your property. And but on the other way, you can take a cellphone and go in the street and record everything. So. So what are we going to do now with all these digital twins? Extended reality content is everywhere.
00:37:46:11 - 00:38:11:22
Abigail Acton
It's it's it sounds like what we really need to do is have another podcast on, you know, the, the open opening of the capacity to do more and more and how we actually assert our own rights to, to, to not be abused within that scenario. So, yeah, that that's a whole other conversation, I think. Very interesting. Absolutely. Veronica, do you want to add anything at all since we've been talking about hyperrealism and, and the possibility for abuse, do you have something to add to that?
00:38:11:23 - 00:38:39:01
Veronica Orvalho
I mean, yeah, I, I just have to say that each of us that develops and even uses are the ultimate responsibility of how the technology should be used, can be used and would impact those around us. So it doesn't really matter how much regulation there is out there. We all have to be responsible for what we do. How can we prevent the wrong use of it?
00:38:39:03 - 00:38:51:22
Veronica Orvalho
It's impossible once you put a technology like ours out there with an API that anyone can grab it. So it goes back to it's kind of like a cycle, right? Goes back to our own level of responsibility. Yes.
00:38:51:24 - 00:39:05:07
Abigail Acton
Yes. Well, thank you very, very much, all of you. For for that very interesting conversation, which, went well beyond the realms of just the technical into all sorts of moral philosophy and, and, and wider applications. That was fascinating. Thank you very much for your time.
00:39:05:08 - 00:39:07:12
Veronica Orvalho
Thank you for hearing it.
00:39:07:14 - 00:39:11:06
Sergi Fernandez
We need to put a project together, guys. So I'm going to send you an email.
00:39:11:08 - 00:39:13:04
Salvador Alvidrez
Yes.
00:39:13:06 - 00:39:14:04
Veronica Orvalho
Definitely.
00:39:14:04 - 00:39:19:07
Abigail Acton
not the first time this has happened. We get some nice synergies going between the guests quite often. I.
00:39:22:08 - 00:39:47:03
Abigail Acton
Do we? Are you interested in what other EU funded projects are doing in the virtual realm? Take a look at issue 103 of the research EU magazine available on the Cordis website Cordis Europa EU. Yeah. You can also find daily news articles and interviews with researchers working in a very broad range of domains, from archeology to zoology. If you are interested in scientific innovation, we'll have something to inspire you.
00:39:47:05 - 00:40:06:13
Abigail Acton
Results packs drill down deeper, gathering groups of projects by subject area, and the magazine offers insights into a different subject every month in its special section. Maybe you're involved in a project or would like to apply for funding. Take a look at what others are doing in your domain. So come and check out the research that's revealing what makes our world tick.
00:40:06:15 - 00:40:25:00
Abigail Acton
Our next episode explores the final frontier space. Join me on a trip to the stars. We're always happy to hear from you. So drop us a line editorial@cordis.europa.eu. Until next time.
El potencial de la realidad virtual (RV) simboliza muchas de las percepciones más positivas del futuro. La idea de entornos digitales realistas y totalmente inmersivos que permiten perderse por completo en otro mundo o en una narrativa absorbente, o ambas cosas, resulta sumamente atractiva. En la cultura popular, probablemente el ejemplo más famoso sea la holocubierta de «Star Trek» que en general coincidía con la visión más utópica del futuro que daba dicha serie. Por supuesto, hay obras de la cultura que han hablado con un tono más cauto sobre la RV o incluso expresado una terrible alarma distópica. Una vez más, puede que el ejemplo más famoso sea la trascendental película de 1999 «Matrix». Entonces, ¿la RV es solo otro motivo de discordia entre los adolescentes adictos a la pantalla y sus padres agotados? De hecho, la RV está estrechamente relacionada con el entretenimiento, en particular con los videojuegos. Dado que la industria de los videojuegos ahora es más grande que la industria del cine en cuanto a ingresos totales, la innovación seguirá proviniendo de este sector. Pero ¿existe un alcance más amplio de la aplicación de la RV más allá de nuestro propio entretenimiento individual? ¿Se pueden aprovechar las características inherentes de la RV, la comunicación a distancia pero en un espacio que se siente íntimo, para revolucionar verdaderamente la forma en la que interactuamos? ¿Pueden los avatares, las representaciones digitales de nosotros mismos, fomentar la empatía o son un medio más que ofrece un manto de anonimato del que se puede abusar? ¿Y las ultrafalsificaciones están a punto de convertirse en 3D? A nuestra presentadora, Abigail Acton, se unen tres investigadores, financiados con fondos europeos, para responder a estas preguntas candentes y más. A Salvador Alvidrez, beneficiario de una beca de investigación en la Universidad de la Reina de Belfast, le interesan los efectos sociopsicológicos de las tecnologías de la comunicación y está analizando la realidad virtual y su función en la lucha contra los prejuicios. ¿Podemos usar la RV para ponernos en el lugar de otra persona? La empresa Didimo de Veronica Orvalho ha patentado la tecnología para crear humanos digitales. Sus inventos han sido utilizados por Microsoft, Universal, Sony y otras empresas. Por último, ¿cómo puede el público sacarle el máximo provecho a la realidad virtual? I2CAT está haciendo que la tecnología sea más asequible e inmersiva. Sergi Fernandez nos explica cómo.
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Palabras clave
CORDIScovery, CORDIS, realidad virtual, RV, avatares