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Preliminary Program

Web3D 2008 :: Infrastructure Evolution

13th International Symposium on 3D Web Technology

August 9, 10 2008 @ LA Convention Center
Sponsored & Co-located with SIGGRAPH 2008
Co-Sponsored by EuroGraphics

Saturday August 9
7:15 Registration open
Coffee & Continental Breakfast
   Big Room  Medium Room
9:00
10:30		 Paper Session:
Streaming and Rendering		 Tutorial:
X3D Event Animation, Scripting and Prototype Extensibility
Coffee
11:00
12:30		 Paper Session:
Applications of X3D		 Tutorial:
COLLADA On The Web – Taking Lessons from Game Development Pipelines
Lunch
1:30
3:00		 Invitation Whitepapers TBD Tutorial:
Ajax3D for Web-Based Virtual Worlds
Coffee
3:30
4:15		 Web3D Keynote: David Luebke, nVidia
4:30
5:30		 X3D PlugFest: Interoperability
6:00
7:00		 Sandbox Keynote: Raph Koster, Metaplace
7:30 Evening Reception
(mixer w/ Sandbox conference @ The Figueroa)

Sunday August 10
8:00 Coffee & Continental Breakfast
   Big Room  Medium Room
9:00
10:30		 Paper Session:
Animation and Geometry		 Tutorial:
Immersive and Augmented Reality with X3D
Coffee
11:00
12:30		 Paper Session:
Patterns and Frameworks		 Tutorial:
Mashups with X3D Earth
Lunch
1:30
3:00		 Panel:
"I see Web3D's Future in..."
Coffee
3:30
5:00		 Web3D Consortium Town Meeting
5:30
7:15		 Banquet Buffet
7:30 Web3D Showcase

 

 

Keynotes

 

DAVID LUEBKE, nVidia

David Luebke is a research lead at NVIDIA Research, which he helped found in 2006 after eight years on the faculty of the University of Virginia. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of North Carolina under Dr. Frederick P. Brooks, Jr., and his Bachelors degree in Chemistry from the Colorado College. Dr. Luebke and his colleagues have produced dozens of papers, articles, chapters, and patents; a short film in the SIGGRAPH 2007 Electronic Theater; the book "Level of Detail for 3D Graphics"; and the Virtial Monticello exhibit seen by over 110,000 visitors to the New Orleans Museum of Art.

Title: The Present & Future of Web3D?

Abstract: The Web3D concept has moved from a primarily academic enterprise to a commercial reality, and is poised to explode into a full-blown industry. But what shape will that industry take? The answer depends on the interplay of several converging trends that are fueling this growth. Increasing bandwidth makes remote rendering a reality. An ecosystem of content and “killer apps” has sprung up, catalyzed by massive multiplayer online games and more recently by social networking. Graphics hardware has made amazing strides in power and mobility. GPU computing has unleashed tremendous and ubiquitous computational horsepower in just the right place: at the edge. I will explore these trends, using examples drawn from commercial and academic efforts around the globe. Meanwhile, realities of commercial distribution have generated some growing pains and tough questions that I will discuss. Finally, looking through the lens of my own experience with real-time rendering, virtual tourism, GPU computing, and the GPU industry, I will speculate on the most important research problems facing Web3D researchers.

 

RAPH KOSTER CEO and Co-founder, Metaplace

A professional game designer and frequent writer on issues of virtual world design, Raph Koster was the lead designer on the seminal online world ULTIMA ONLINE, which first brought online worlds to the mass market. Until March 2006 he was Chief Creative Officer for Sony Online Entertainment, makers of EVERQUEST, where he previously led the design of STAR WARS GALAXIES. His essays and writings on online world design include widely reprinted and influential pieces such as "Declaring the Rights of Players", "The Laws of Online World Design", and "A Story About a Tree". He is in demand as a speaker and lecturer on issues of online world design, particularly in the area of community building. He is a regular speaker at the Game Developers Conference, and is the maintainer of the canonical history of virtual worlds at his website, http://www.raphkoster.com. His book A THEORY OF FUN FOR GAME DESIGN was published in 2004 by Paraglyph Press and is used in several university courses as study material.

 

Tutorials

Topic: COLLADA On The Web – Taking Lessons from Game Development Pipelines

During this presentation we will demonstrate how COLLADA (an open standard by the Khronos group) can be used in the development of rich web graphics. The process of creating COLLADA content for Web can be very similar to the one used in the development of next-gen videogame titles. Using high-end 3D software such as Maya and XSI together with tools like Flux Studio, attendees will learn new techniques that will enable them to quickly and efficiently integrate COLLADA in a Web environment. During this tutorial session it will be covered all the functionalities of COLLADA useful for the Web such as asset interchange (geometry, animation) and the creation of shaders using FX Composer and then implemented in Flash using Papervision3D. Attendees will also be introduced to tools such as “DAE2X3D” that converts COLLADA files to X3D.

Presenter: Bruno Patatas, Biodroid Entertainment

 

Topic: X3D Event Animation, Scripting and Prototype Extensibility

Extensible 3D (X3D) graphics is a collection of open standards that integrate network-enabled 3D graphics and multimedia. X3D applications are real-time, interactive, animated systems that can run stand-alone or in networked virtual environments. This tutorial will focus on a critical subset of the complete functionality that is encoded in XML. During the tutorial, the participants will learn hands-on how to build an X3D world, while getting a detailed understanding of the capabilities of X3D.

Specific topics include animation using interpolators and sequencers, scripting, prototypes for extensibility, and a software-visualization case study. We will use the new free cross-platform X3D-Edit authoring tool. Participants will also be given the latest X3D Software Development Kit (SDK) which contains a wide variety of free + commercial plug-ins, authoring tools, and content. [Note to reviewers: This is an abridged version of the tutorial that will be presented at Eurographics 2008 in April.]

Presenters: Don Brutzman Ph.D., Naval Postgraduate School & X3D WG Co-Chair
Craig Anslow

 

Topic: Immersive and Augmented Reality with X3D

Conceptually, the semantics of the X3D ISO-Standard describe an abstract functional behavior of time-based, interactive 3D, multimedia information and do not at all specify a specific software or hardware setup. However, X3D clients and applications today are mainly built for desktop systems running a web-browser. In this course we explore how suitable X3D and W3C technologies can be
utilized as an application and programming model for virtual and augmented environments. Different extensions and systems are presented and discussed which are useful or even necessary to build immersive environments with X3D. Topics include strategies for low-level tasks like device handling and cluster rendering as well as high-level setups for various interaction and navigation methods.

Presenters: Johannes Behr Ph.D. and team, Fraunhofer IGD

 

Topic: Mashups with X3D Earth

Years of evolution in the CARTO BOF, industry consortia, and real world applications has finally born a truly open system for geo-referenced 3D scenes. This course starts with a brief overview of the X3D Earth Specification, including geometry and coordinate systems. Participants will gain an understanding of how geospatial coordinates systems are used and how geometry is expressed using geospatial coordinates. The bulk of this course is how-to demonstrations and examples of data mashups with X3D Earth. Participants will learn how to overlay data on an X3D Earth Globe such as visualizing US Census data. We will also demonstrate how to reuse Google Earth Placemarks in X3D Earth. Finally, use of X3D Earth in deployed research systems will be presented: 3D Replay - Oceanographic data visualization from MBARI.

Presenters: Alan Hudson, Yumetech & President Web3D Consortium;
Mike McCann, Monterey Bay Research Institute (MBARI)

 

Topic: Ajax3D for Web-Based Virtual Worlds

This course provides skills and techniques for integrating interactive 3D scenes, 2D web pages, and web servers into virtual world applications. This will be a highly interactive presentation, and participants will need wireless access for best learning. There will be a number of in-class exercises: participants will learn how to insert X3D content into web pages, develop reusable component objects, and provide interaction between the web browser, X3D viewer, and web servers using Javascript, DHTML, XML, and Ajax.

Presenters: Leonard Daly, Daly Realism & X3D WG Secretary
Tony Parisi, Vivaty


Special Sessions

X3D PlugFest : Interoperability

Come join X3D venders in testing X3D browser interoperability. This event will test how browsers are playing the same content. Bring your content to help improve browsers. Spec authors and browser implementors will be here to debate the finer points of the X3D specification and to defend their interpretations. Coming from the event we'll have a better understanding of what content works right between browsers and where the spec and implementations need more work.

Presubmitted content will receive priority. We expect that we will run out time so presubmission is strongly recommended. This will allow everyone to have more time to review the material beforehand.

We expect to uncover the following types of issues:

For this year we'd like to concentrate on X3D Interactive and Immersive
level content.

Content Authors:

Tired of putting "Best viewed with browser X?". Come and bring your favorite content to help improve browsers. Talk with X3D Browser Implementers and learn how to get your content viewing across all browsers.

Browser Vendors:

Come and bring your latest browser version. Legions of free testers will explore the crevices of your implementation and show you how to improve your product. Bring technical staff who know the insides. Debate the finer points of spec interpretation with other implementers.

Tool Vendors:

Ever wanted to ask a browser implementor what a feature enables? ...

Send content and a description of any problems to Alan Hudson, alan.hudson at web3d.org

Please indicate whether the content can be posted publically for review or should be deleted after the event.

 

PANEL : "I See Web3D's Future in..."

Moderator:

Rita Turkowski - Intel Corporation

Panelists:

Johannes Behr - Fraunhofer IGD

Mimi Harris - Rivers Run Red

Remi Arnaud - Intel Software Solutions

Marty Poulin - Social Sage

Doug Twilleager - Sun Microsystems/Wonderland

Mark Young - Google

Vladimir Vukicevic - Mozilla/Firefox

 

Paper Sessions

DAY 1 Session 1: Streaming and Rendering

DAY 1 Session 2: Applications of X3D

DAY 2 Session 1: Animation and Geometry

DAY 2 Session 2: Patterns and Frameworks

...