Dean of Postgraduate Research
Vice-Chancellor’s Office
Extension: 7285
Email:
lucy.johnston@canterbury.ac.nz
Summer Research Scholarship Scheme
2015-2016
Project Application Form
Please complete and submit the application form as a WORD document and send to
summerscholarships@canterbury.ac.nz
The Project
Title of Project (max 30 words):
Desktop AR Authoring Tool
Project Leader(s):
Gun Lee
Mark Billinghurst
Host Department/Organization:
Human Interface Technology Laboratory New Zealand (HIT Lab NZ)
Other persons involved in this topic/activity:
(List other significant members involved along with their affiliation to the research project.)
Name
Affiliation to project
Huidong Bai
Envisage AR Ltd
Brief outline of project
Describe the proposed research project – maximum of 400 words (box will expand as you type).
This project involves the development of a desktop Augmented Reality (AR) authoring tool. The partner
company, Envisage AR, produces an AR authoring tool, BuildAR, primarily targeting the educational market.
The project will involve completing the port of the existing Windows version of the software to the Mac OSX
platform, and improving the user interface and user experience. There is already some Mac OSX code
written, so the project will complete the work already begun and improve upon it.
Project research will be conducted on current use of the software, user needs, and desired features that
should be included in version 2.0 of the application. Once the port of the current application is completed,
then this research will be used to determine the desired feature set and work will be done to implement some
of these features.
As part of the software port and upgrade, the application will need to be built with the newest version of the
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ARToolKit tracking library (see http://www.artoolkit.org/), enabling the student working on the project to gain
experience with one of the most popular Augmented Reality software libraries. The successful student will be
able to work closely with Envisage AR staff to help them learn AR programming as quickly as possible, and
to support them in the application development work.
Overall, the project will provide an excellent opportunity for a student to learn about how to build interactive
Augmented Reality applications, gain valuable user interface and interaction design skills, and to increase
their programming skills on the Mac OSX platform.
If the project involves work away from the University campus (e.g., at fieldwork sites) please detail all locations.
The project will not involve work away from University Campus.
If the student be required to work outside of normal university hours (8am-5pm) please provide details
N/A
Benefits student will gain from involvement in the project
Describe the research experience and skills that the student will acquire through involvement in this research project –
maximum of 100 words.
The student will be working with a start-up company under supervision of experienced UC academics in the
HIT Lab NZ. He/she will gain knowledge in developing desktop Augmented Reality applications, improve
their 3D graphics programming skills and gain knowledge in how to develop intuitive AR user interfaces.
They will also gain experience from working on a commercial software produce and learn how to develop
and document commercial grade code.
Specific student requirements
Please provide details of all requirements you have for the student to work on this project – for example, if specific
courses/experience are necessary.
The student should have a strong software background and programming ability in C++. They should have
experience with developing 3D graphics applications, especially for the Mac OSX operating system. They
should have an interest in Augmented Reality and developing Augmented Reality applications.
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