Virtual Agent Rendering Demo

The GTI research team mainly focuses on 3D graphics on the web and human-machine interaction (HCI). We work with many partners worldwide, both in the industry and in academia. We are collaborating in three European Projects: PRESENT, HDR4EU and SAUCE.

Virtual assistants are becoming more and more popular with each passing day. Everyone wants a digital assistant to help their users! With this in mind, we are currently working on creating a holographic virtual clerk that knows everything about the UPF Poblenou Campus. This web-based embodied conversational agent, called EVA, carries out receptionist tasks.

On the one hand, EVA needs to understand what she is told and reply back in a natural way. On the other hand, our virtual clerk needs to look alive. To achieve this, we developed and implemented various rendering techniques to visualize EVA in real-time at an interactive frame rate, using our open source online 3D editor, WebGLStudio.

Physically based rendering (PBR) techniques are the basis of the current rendering pipeline implementation. The current PBR algorithm uses indirect illumination given by a High Dynamic Range (HDR) 3D environment. These types of environments, unlike standard dynamic range ones, can be used to achieve realistic renders, offering more detail when illuminating 3D models.

The demo on the right (feel free to click on it!) shows our virtual assistant, EVA. Currently we are working on making the character more alive with facial animations. We are also working on improving the render with new shaders for eyes, skin and hair.

Keep up to date with the GTI progress by following us on Twitter or take a look at our website https://www.upf.edu/web/gti !