Content creation for seamless augmented experiences with projection mapping (2015)

This dissertation explores systems and methods for creating projection mapping content that seamlessly merges virtual and physical. Most virtual reality and augmented reality technologies rely on screens for display and interaction, where a mobile device or head mounted display mediates the user's experience. In contrast, projection mapping uses off-the-shelf video projectors to augment the appearance of physical objects, and with projection mapping there is no screen to mediate the experience. The physical world simply becomes the display. Projection mapping can provide users with a seamless augmented experience, where virtual and physical become indistinguishable in an apparently unmediated way.\n\nProjection mapping is an old concept dating to Disney's 1969 Haunted Mansion. The core technical foundations were laid back in 1999 with UNC's Office of the Future and Shader Lamps projects. Since then, projectors have gotten brighter, higher resolution, and drastically decreased in price. Yet projection mapping has not crossed the chasm into mainstream use. The largest remaining challenge for projection mapping is that content creation is very difficult and time consuming. Content for projection mapping is still created via a tedious manual process by warping a 2D video file onto a 3D physical object using existing tools (e.g. Adobe Photoshop) which are not made for defining animated interactive effects on 3D object surfaces. \n\nWith existing tools, content must be created for each specific display object, and cannot be re-used across experiences. For each object the artist wants to animate, the artist must manually create a custom texture for that specific object, and warp the texture to the physical object. This limits projection mapped experiences to controlled environments and static scenes. If the artist wants to project onto a different object from the original, they must start from scratch creating custom content for that object. This manual content creation process is time consuming, expensive and doesn't scale.\n\nThis thesis explores new methods for creating projection mapping content. Our goal is to make projection mapping easier, cheaper and more scalable. We explore methods for adaptive projection mapping, which enables artists to create content once, and that content adapts based on the color and geometry of the display surface. Content can be created once, and re-used on any surface. \n\nThis thesis is composed of three proof-of-concept prototypes, exploring new methods for content creation for projection mapping. IllumiRoom expands video game content beyond the television screen and into the physical world using a standard video projector to surround a television with projected light. IllumiRoom works in any living room, the projected content dynamically adapts based on the color and geometry of the room. RoomAlive expands on this idea, using multiple projectors to cover an entire living room in input/output pixels and dynamically adapts gaming experiences to fill an entire room. Finally, Projectibles focuses on the physical aspect of projection mapping. Projectibles optimizes the display surface color to increase the contrast and resolution of the overall experience, enabling artists to design the physical object along with the virtual content.\n\nThe proof-of-concept prototypes presented in this thesis are aimed at the not-to-distant future. The projects in this thesis are not theoretical concepts, but fully working prototype systems that demonstrate the practicality of projection mapping to create immersive experiences. It is the sincere hope of the author that these experiences quickly move of the lab and into the real world.