Fall 2021: CS 6334 Virtual Reality

Course Information

Term: Fall 2021
Class Level: Graduate
Activity Type: Lecture
Days & Times: Monday & Wednesday 8:30 AM – 9:45 AM
Location: JSOM 12.214

Instructor: Prof. Yu Xiang
Office Location: ECSS 4.702
Office Hours: Monday & Wednesday 2:30PM – 3:30 PM

Teaching Assistant: Yatharth Singhal
Office Hours: Tuesday 2:00PM – 3:00PM on Microsoft Teams

Syllabus

All the course materials can be found here.

Course Description

Theory and practice of virtual reality (VR). Provides in-depth overview of VR, including geometry and physics of virtual worlds, visual rendering, visual perception, pose tracking, interaction hardware, audio and haptics, locomotion, selection and manipulation, and robotic interfaces.

Textbooks

Steven M. LaValle. Virtual Reality. To be published by Cambridge University Press. Available online: http://lavalle.pl/vr/

LaViola, J., Kruijff, E., McMahan, R., Bowman, D., and Poupyrev, I. 3D User Interfaces: Theory and Practice, 2^nd Edition. Addison-Wesley Professional, 2017. (Optional)

Grading Policy

• Homework (40%)
  • Assignment 1 (10%)
  • Assignment 2 (10%)
  • Assignment 3 (10%)
  • Assignment 4 (10%)
• Team Project (55%)
  • Project proposal (5%)
  • Project mid-term report (10%)
  • Project presentation (15%)
  • Project final report (25%)
• In-class Activity (5%)

Project

• Project description (PDF)
• Project proposal requirement (PDF)
• Project mid-term report requirement (PDF)
• Project presentation and final report requirement (PDF)

Homework

• Assignment 1 (PDF, programming)
• Assignment 2 (PDF, programming)
• Assignment 3 (PDF, programming)
• Assignment 4 (PDF, programming)

Guest Lecturer

Dr. Ankur Handa from NVIDIA Research talked about VR and Robotics on 12/1/2021.

Lectures

Date	Topic
Week 1, 8/23, lecture 1	Introduction to Virtual Reality (slides)
Week 1, 8/25, Lecture 2	The Geometry of Virtual Worlds (slides)
Week 2, 8/30, Lecture 3	The Physics of Virtual Worlds (slides)
Week 2, 9/1, Lecture 4	Camera Models (slides)
Week 3, 9/6	Labor Day
Week 3, 9/8, Lecture 5	Lenses (slides)
Week 4, 9/13, Lecture 6	Visual Rendering: Vertex Transforms (slides)
Week 4, 9/15, Lecture 7	Visual Rendering: Rasterization, Lighting and Shading, Fragment Processing (slides)
Week 5, 9/20, Lecture 8	Visual Perception: Human Visual System and Color Perception (slides)
Week 5, 9/22, Lecture 9	Visual Perception: Depth Perception (slides)
Week 6, 9/27, Lecture 10	Visual Perception: Motion Perception (slides)
Week 6, 9/29, Lecture 11	Visual Display (slides)
Week 7, 10/4, Lecture 12	Head Tracking and IMUs (slides)
Week 7, 10/6, Lecture 13	Pose Tracking I (slides)
Week 8, 10/11, Lecture 14	Pose Tracking II (slides)
Week 8, 10/13, Lecture 15	Pose Tracking: Structure from Motion and SLAM (slides)
Week 9, 10/18, Lecture 16	Introduction to Convolutional Neural Networks (slides)
Week 9, 10/20, Lecture 17	Pose Tracking: Object Pose Estimation and Tracking (slides)
Week 10, 10/25, Lecture 18	Pose Tracking: Articulated Object Tracking (slides)
Week 10, 10/27, Lecture 19	Audio: Physics, Physiology and Perception (slides)
Week 11, 11/1, Lecture 20	Audio: Rendering (slides)
Week 11, 11/3, Lecture 21	Haptics (slides)
Week 12, 11/8, Lecture 22	Interaction: Motor Programs and Remapping (slides)
Week 12, 11/10, Lecture 23	Interaction: Locomotion (slides)
Week 13, 11/15, Lecture 24	Interaction: Selection and Manipulation (slides)
Week 13, 11/17, Lecture 25	Interaction: System Control and Social Interaction (slides)
Week, 14, 11/22	Fall break
Week 14, 11/24	Fall break
Week 15, 11/29, Lecture 26	Robotic Interfaces (slides)
Week 15, 12/1	Guest Lecture: Dr. Ankur Handa (slides)
Week 16, 12/6	Project Presentation I Group 1: Smash the City (slides, demo) Group 2: The LITTLE Island (slides, demo) Group 4: 3D Greedy Snake (slides, demo) Group 6: Escape Room (slides, demo)
Week 16, 12/8	Project Presentation II Group 5: Redline (slides, demo) Group 7: Interactive Learning for Kids (slides, demo) Group 9: AR Group Coordinator (slides, demo) Group 10: HoopShot (slides, demo)