Virtual co-presence

A man in front of a figure on a green screen which assumes an identical position

Project overview

Recent advances in Extended Reality (XR) and RGB-depth sensing cameras make it possible to design and create ways to ‘teleport’ collaborators into each other’s spatial environments to enable an immersive sense of being in each other’s physical presence. Current professional volumetric capture solutions however, require large inflexible facilities, with an emphasis on scripted interactions, limiting their application in dynamic, social XR experiences.

In this project we respond to this challenge by creating mobile, synchronous, interactive experiences for remote communication, collaboration and social participation. Using a head-mounted display (such as a Magic Leap, HoloLens, or VR), a person can see another person standing before them, interacting within the same space. We call this experience ‘virtual co-presence’.

Our research seeks to create the enabling technology and to investigate the human experience of virtual co-presence.

  • How does volumetric XR promote immersive experiences?
  • What XR designs strengthen human presence, awareness and embodiment?
  • How can user interaction be facilitated during capture and engagement scenarios?

Project team

  • Frank Vetere
    Frank Vetere, Professor
  • Andrew Irlitti, Research Fellow In Mixed Reality
  • Jingcheng Wang, Research Assistant
  • Mesut Latifoglu, Research Assistant
  • Zaher Joukhadar, Research Data Specialist, Melbourne Data Analytics Platform
  • Thuong Hoang, School of Information Technology, Deakin University