Florent Berthaut

Scenography of immersive virtual musical instruments

Immersive Virtual Musical Instruments (IVMIs) can be considered as the meeting between Music Technology and Virtual Reality. Being both musical instruments and elements of Virtual Environments, IVMIs require a transversal approach from their designers, in particular when the final aim is to play them in front of an audience, as part of a scenography. In this paper, we combine the main constraints of musical performances and Virtual Reality applications into a set of dimensions, meant to extensively describe IVMIs stage setups. A number of existing stage setups are then classified using these dimensions, explaining how they were used to showcase live virtual performances and discussing their scenographic level.

Dynamir: Optical Manipulations Using Dynamic Mirror Brushes

Mirror surfaces are part of our everyday life. Among them, curved mirrors are used to enhance our perception of the physical space, e.g., convex mirrors are used to increase our field of view in the street, and concave mirrors are used to zoom in on parts our face in the bathroom. In this paper, we investigate the opportunities opened when these mirrors are made dynamic, so that their effects can be modulated to adapt to the environment or to a users actions. We introduce the concept of dynamic mirror brushes that can be moved around a mirror surface. We describe how these brushes can be used for various optical manipulations of the physical space. We also present an implementation using a flexible mirror sheet and three scenarios that demonstrate some of the interaction opportunities.