Todd Ogle: Applying Immersive Environments to Content at Virginia Tech

By Luke Lightning

May 12, 2022

In this week's episode of the Future Construct Podcast (23 min interview), we are excited to feature Todd Ogle, PhD, Executive Director of the Applied Research in Immersive Experiences and Simulations (ARIES) program at Virginia Tech (@virginia_tech), and our host Amy Peck (@AmyPeckXR). Todd and Amy were able to catch up at the 2022 Geo Week conference (@GeoWeekExpo) in Denver earlier this year to record this episode. We look forward to seeing you at Geo Week 2023, and you can keep up to date on all the Geo Week News here!

Click to listen to our interview with Todd on Apple, Spotify, Audible, or Google, or watch on our Facebook or YouTube channels.

Highlights of Todd’s interview with host Amy Peck (@AmyPeckXR) include:

• Some of the challenges Todd has found in leveraging reality technology and utilizing cross-functionality and how he overcame them using technology

• Difficulties in developing and processing renderings of a particular village project

• How some projects predate newer optimizations tools, and the industry is beginning to revisit them while determining if there are industry standards yet

• Exciting new developments in the world of technology and his ideal product for the future

In his role at Virginia Tech, Todd leads the program, which applies immersive environments and simulations to the content creation and educational programs provided by the University Libraries, such as:

• Content to be held in the University Library’s learning object repository, Odyssey

• University Library instruction and student digital literacy programs

• Open educational resource creation

• Research and institutional data visualization

• Digital Collections-building and Digital Humanities

The ARIES program supports applied research that brings together industry
partners, faculty, and students interested in the cognitive and affective aspects of
learning in immersive environments, games, simulations for training and
performance support, and more. It provides a destination for students to discover,
create and share their own creations in the form of games, simulations, VR and AR experiences for learning and entertainment while having the informal interactions with interested peers, faculty, industry partners, and external researchers that are so valuable for student development.

Click to listen to our interview with Todd on Apple, Spotify, Audible, or Google, or watch on our Facebook or YouTube channels.

Show Notes

0:12  Amy Peck introduces Todd Ogle, Executive Director of the Applied Research in Immersive Experiences and Simulations (ARIES) program at Virginia Tech.

02:06  This project is one of the perfect use cases, leveraging augmented reality and virtual reality, and utilizing cross functionality. What are some of the challenges you've found, and how did you overcome them using technology?

10:26  So give us somewhat of a snapshot of this project you've been working on. I've been so impressed with how you're looking at open source and leveraging it wherever you can, and how important that is, so I'd love to hear your perspective.

12:38  So you had two former students who are out there in the wild, working in the industry, and you know, there are a lot of tools. Some of the renderings you shared of the village really looked fantastic, but it was not an easy process. Can you talk about that?

16:54  One of your students was talking about the different levels of decimation. Some of these projects were long before some of these optimizations tools were even out there, and it seems like now you're revisiting them. Are there even standards yet that tell you sizing, or are you just sort of guessing?

19:36  If you could project yourself 20 years into the future, and if you could have any product or service or gadget or thing, that for you, would make your life better or make you personally happy, what would it be and what would it do?

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