Mobile AR Animation Tool for Reporting Unidentified Aerial Phenomena

Open Human-Computer Interaction Games Engineering Bachelor Master Project Thesis Games Research Lab

Background

Thousands of incidents of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) have been reported and meticulously documented. While oftentimes well-founded explanations are unearthed in hindsight, the nature of a considerable number of cases is still subject to speculation. Even just describing and logging the events is a hard challenge—all the more considering their short time spans, the unusual visuals and velocities, as well as the witnesses’ challenging situations.

Task

In this project, a reporting tool for UAP will be developed: A mobile augmented reality (AR) application to help the witness or a scientific investigator to quickly sketch out the perceived phenomena in-situ such that visual occurrences, involved movements and speeds can be reconstructed in the very environments where the events took place. In order to arrive at an effective tool, the software will be developed following a user-centered engineering approach not only informed from requirements that become apparent when studying the scientific literature on UAP but also from requirements communicated by research experts in the field.

Literature

1. Shin, M., Kim, B. S., & Park, J. (2005, October). AR storyboard: an augmented reality based interactive storyboard authoring tool. In Fourth IEEE and ACM international symposium on mixed and augmented reality (ISMAR’05) (pp. 198-199). IEEE.
2. Chan, J. K. Future of Aircraft Accident Investigation (AAI) Training:”Digital Crash Lab” through the Applications of Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) Technology.
3. Teodorani, M. (2009). A Comparative Analytical and Observational Study of North American Databases on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena.
4. Ma, M., Zheng, H., & Lallie, H. (2010). Virtual reality and 3D animation in forensic visualization. Journal of forensic sciences, 55(5), 1227-1231.
5. Loeb, A. (2022). “Down to Earth” Limits on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena in Ukraine (Comment on arXiv: 2208.11215). arXiv preprint arXiv:2210.01972.
6. McVittie, C., & McKinlay, A. (2023). “I don’t mean extradimensional in a woo-woo sense”: Doing non-explanation in discussions of unidentified aerial phenomena. Language & Communication, 88, 90-98.

Idea by: Chabin, L.: La realité augmentée au service de la fidélité des rapports d’enquête et des études en psychologie de la perception. CAIPAN-2, Toulouse, 2022: https://www.cnes-geipan.fr/fr/node/59754

Contact Persons at the University Würzburg