REAP Review

The client presentation for REAP were yesterday. The various teams presented their ideas to the REAP exec team, as well as to some stakeholders that might be using the products of our research. All the presentations that I saw were very interesting. I'm looking forward to seeing what that subsequent REAP teams do with the progress made so far.

Our presentation on the Mixed Reality Interface (MRI) went fairly smoothly(Note to self: avoid making last minute demo changes. >_<). We talked about our plans of using the MRI table to create virtual museum exhibits to enhance user go-ers experiences in museums. Because of the playful and tactile nature of the table, kids would be quite attracted to this sort of exhibit. We are currently working with the Earth Sciences museum on campus to create a mining exhibit as a proof of concept. The museum is currently converting a hallway in the building to be a mini mining exhibit. We hope to be able to get a virtually enhanced exhibit to go along with the physical one by around the end of October. One of the subsequent REAP teams will be putting in a lot of game design effort into making this project happen.

After the presentations, we all went to celebrate with lunch at the University Club. I always wondered what was in that building, and now I know. :P Weee!

In general, REAP was a great opportunity. We got to meet some great people in the digital projection industry, as well as work with some really bright people. We also got a chance to meet with people from all sorts of industries, like museum curators and home designers. The REAP members also got to play with all sorts of cool technologies. Other than the MRI table, we got to play with Microtiles, Unity, and Sketch Up, all while getting paid.  To top things off, we also got a lot of training throughout the semester, including a few sessions on Agile project management. :) As far as part time jobs go, this was a very rewarding one. :)

If' you're interested in joining REAP in a future term, you can apply on the REAP site, but I should mention that hiring for the September term is finished. They still might need people for on-demand work (especially people with game design or game development background). If you are interested in one of those positions, you can email REAP or myself. :)