Portfolio

We are trying to better understand the dreams of people with traumatic childhood experiences. This research was approved by the Ethics Committee of the City University of Hong Kong. We are recruiting participants for this study now. Complete a quick,…

Augmented Materiality Lab PhD researchers Royce Ng and Daniel Eckhoff and research assistant Mengyao Zhu are currently developing novel virtual and augmented reality systems for use in palliative care in collaboration with the clinical psychologist Olive Woo. Some findings from…

3D modelling and printing are becoming increasingly popular. However, beginners often face high barriers of entry when trying to use existing 3D modelling tools, even for creating simple objects. This is further complicated on mobile devices by the lack of…

A remarkable result from integral geometry is Cauchy’s formula, which relates the mean path length of ballistic trajectories randomly crossing a convex 2D domain, to the ratio between the region area and its perimeter. This theorem has been generalized for…

Researcher: Royce Ng An exploration on the relations between visualization in Tibetan Buddhist meditation practices and virtual reality technology (with neurofeedback) and potential applications as therapeutic intervention in palliative care. This study will develop a series of virtual and augmented…

The Shybots were an informal experiment demonstrating how little is needed to ellicit a sense of agency on an innanimate object. Philosophers of the mind such a Daniel Dennett call the phenomena of attributing intentionality to everything around us, the “intentional stance“.…

An interactive installation exploring the relationship between shape, geometry, resonance and energy. https://videopress.com/v/PJhLr4US?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&autoPlay=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true Cymatic Ground (Alvaro Cassinelli & Tobias Klein*) is a hybrid between an architectural representation and a sonic scultpture. It is an interactive model – an installation in…

This project aims to create “synthetic dreams” useful for the design of customized VR compassion focus therapy scenarios. The system relies on data collected from a wearable that continuosly monitor the user’s emotional response to everyday stimuli (places, people and…

A traditional Japanese garden is a miniaturised natural landscape. Following clear aesthetic principles (symbolism and scene borrowing, concealment and balance in balanced asymmetry), a Japanese garden induces meditation through peaceful contemplation. Inspired by nature, it is nonetheless a man-made work of…

We demonstrate a method capable of turning textured surfaces (in particular textile patches) into opportunistic input interfaces with a machine learning model pre-trained on acoustic signals generated by scratching different fabrics. A single short audio recording is then sufficient to…

An AI reinterprets the ephemeral nature of human dance using trails of laser light projected on the surface of phosphorescent rocks https://vimeo.com/674272884 A collaboration with artist Eugenia Kim exploring the meaning of embodiment as seen by a machine. Dance and…

PRESENCE PRESENCE is a performance which responds to the constraints put upon live performance and international travel as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and uses live-motion capture of the artists face in Hong Kong, projection mapped as a digital…

Online lectures on platforms like Zoom are widely used all around the world since the COVID-19 pandemic. Though a few studies showed that the teaching quality is relatively good, empirical observation has shown that students get distracted much easier than…

Overview Trained with profile pictures collected from dating apps for gay men, the artist and the artificial intelligence (AI) collaborate to generate a series of images. Based on generative adversarial network, the AI is supposed to learn the general style…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L328rF1m_qY HORIZON is an interactive audiovisual piece created for the 360 stereoscopic panorama Gallery in the school of creative media in CityU. The piece explores the relationship between space and horizon while experimenting with visual and spatial codes and illusions…

AURA is an interactive installation designed for the 360° projection theatre immersive system. Besides the circular projection wall, this project utilizes two TV screen through which the users can interact with the projected image. The first TV screen works as…

The Context-Based 3D Haptic Grid extends the visual and haptic feedback of the real-world to help users do precise mid-air 3D manipulations. Our system creates 3D grids that surround each object (virtual and real) in the scene to help users…

This project explores how the human brain and body respond to Augmented Reality experiences and how these findings can be used to develop novel medical therapies. This research project aims to investigate the extent to which augmented reality (AR) experiences…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vu4Bgv0S_Ds This project explores scalable methods for repurposing existing fields of light (e.g. from the sun or conventional electric lights). Using a combination of commodity components, we are creating mechanisms to steer and calibrate arrays of mirrors to synthesise fields…

PTSD is an anxiety disorder caused by various traumatic stressors(e.g.; life-threatening accidents, natural disasters, sexual /physical/emotional abuse, and war) and is accompanied by multiple physical and mental comorbidities as well as strong suicidal tendencies. This research aims to contribute to…

“Spiritual World” is an interactive immersive projection trying to build an inner world to show the self-reflection process of participants visually and show the relationship between participants. Experiencing the “Spiritual World” is like entering other people’s inner world or let…

An interactive laser-based projection system capable of sensing touch at a distance without the use of external cameras. This research includes developing a “Laser Graphics Processing Unit” (LGPU) featuring a proposed re-configurable graphics pipeline capable of minimal latency interactive feedback,…

This installation invites people to chat over a table. The words, freed from the speakers, begin a life of their own. Words that are on topic live longer and grow; others die on the the shore, along with particles and…

What is it like to be a (virtual) bat? The research based art work ‘What is it like to be a virtual bat?’ is the second in a series of multispecies, sensory ethnographies around the ecosystems of Lantau Island, Hong…

The research based artwork Bubalus bubalis /16HZ-40,000HZ is the first of a series of works which adopts a ‘creaturely perspective’ that at once elevate more sensual, elemental and cosmopolitical understandings of multispecies perspectives, while documenting a mode of human animal-nonhuman…

Overview Since cyclists are highly sensitive to road surface conditions and hazards they require more detailed information when navigating their route. To facilitate a better understanding of what causes hazardous conditions to cyclists we created a dataset of classified hazardous…

[collaboration with the ESPCI – Ecole Superieure de Physique Chimie de Paris] We present a counterintuitive method to create a time-reversed wave by applying a time-controlled dissipation pulse. By successive application of this principle, we can destroy a monochromatic component…

Incredible as it may be, and despite the widespread recognition of Leonardo Da Vinci as the “father” of aerodynamics, nobody seems to have studied the aerodynamic efficiency of one of his more iconic designs: the aerial screw. I modelled the…

Serial Paintings (in collaboration with Daniel Saakes) aims at revealing hidden aspects of the physical and mathematical relationship between perceived image and its material support. In “Back and Forth – anadrome pneumatique“, a string of colored balls is pushed back…

Integration of 3D stereoscopic laser-projection and conventional stereoscopic video This research project involves developing stereoscopic projections with a galvo-mirror laser projection system. In this work, we demonstrate a stereoscopic laser-based display integrating three-dimensional laser-based vector graphic into a dynamic scene…

Teaching subjects which involve practical demonstrations present major challenges when performed online.  Such subjects include physical computing, digital fabrication, electronics, chemistry, and traditional crafts.  An overhead camera system has gone some way to addressing these challenges but from our experience…

Spoken words begin a life of their own, desperate to join semantically close friends. https://www.youtube.com/embed/_BshWlD64yk?feature=oembed VivaVoce invites its public to discuss around a table. As soon as a word escapes a mouth, it begins a life of its own over…

Project Esky is BEER Labs’ home-brewed technology, enabling high fidelity Extended Reality (XR) experiences to be developed on any experimental hardware! With it, we use Project North Star & Project Ariel open-sourced, PC teathered headsets to rapidly create content and…

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are an underestimated public health threat. It impairs children’s brain development, immune system, and hormonal systems. These impairments predispose children to various chronic mental and physical dis- eases. However, its negative impacts are not widely known…

We are at a loss when words or pictures refuse to reveal their immediate purpose. Yet despite its graphical profusion, Leonardo Da Vinci’s Codex is very lucid in this respect: every page offers immediate enjoyment, regardless of a professional grasp…