KIT208 – Virtual and Mixed Reality Technology

AT4

Development of Interface Application

Daniel Thomson [575576], Jonathan Charleston [623759], Mingyang Yin [619211], Jes Lewincamp [497495], Connor Brooks [595866]

Introduction / Overview

What is Pet Good?

Author: Daniel 

Pet Good is the ultimate VR experience for aspiring pet owners, allowing users to learn to take care of their pet without its well-being in the balance. Dive into immersive simulations that teach you how to create a comfortable environment for birds, fish, dogs, and cats, ensuring a smooth transition into pet ownership. PetGood: Your guide to becoming a responsible pet parent without trial and error.

Description of the application

Author: Young

Pet Good is an educational VR app designed to learn how to care for a pet for people who want a user pet. The app contains several different pets which are birds, fish, dogs and cats. Pet Good uses VR technology to allow people to experience the joy and responsibility of owning a pet by simulating the actual operation of pet ownership in real life. When users enter Pet Good, users can raise, pet, or grab the pet to experience the same feeling as a real pet (Lin, C and et.al. 2017) In these ways, people can reduce the anxiety of not knowing how to care for real pets after they have them. In addition, Pet Good provides certain instructional videos or texts on pet care to enhance people's knowledge.

Pet Good has important implications in addressing the problem of people not knowing how to care for their pets after having a real pet. First of all, Pet Good provides the simulated interactions and learning sessions necessary for people to get their pets before they get them, thereby increasing the hands-on experience and allowing people to truly understand the behaviour and needs of their pets. In addition, because Pet Good offers virtual pets, people do not have to bear any losses if they make mistakes and can learn from the mistakes they make so that people can be fully prepared before getting a real pet. Second, Pet Good's immersive experience can also appeal to people who are struggling to keep a pet, because the app's real simulation can make them feel the fun of keeping a pet and finally raise a real pet.

Description of the interface solution

The downfall of conventional virtual pet training experiences is that they are often theory dense, word or visual-based programs that have minimal user input. Pet training software utilising traditional interfaces does not prompt the user to physically perform and ingrain the actions of caring for their pet; it is limited to conveying training through text or visuals. The disconnect between the virtual and the actual is vast and can make the training less engaging and effective. Conversely, learning about your pet on the job can be risky, and inexperience may lead to your pet being unintentionally mistreated. Having this software in VR bridges these two forms, where you can learn in an engaging, interactive, yet risk-free environment.

One crucial aspect of putting this software in VR is scale. In PetGood dog training, the user is required to identify hazards in a house environment. A key aspect of identifying hazards to small pets is looking at the space from the pet’s perspective. VR allows for this; the user can sit and experience the environment from a lower height. This teaches a method that would be harder to convey with traditional interfaces.

People are used to the affordances of operating in a 3D space; as such, the controls for VR are more intuitive. Furthermore, VR prompts the user to mirror real world pet training actions. This ingrains muscle memory, so the user can more easily recall these actions when they are actually caring for their pet. 

Using VR software, the user experience can be customised and tailored. The user can engage with the tasks at a pace that is suitable for their experience level, slowing down or replaying as they see fit. Tasks and learning experiences can be played out without the stresses and expectations of a normal pet interaction, helping the overall learning premise. 

Ultimately, a video can’t make a user feel like they are petting a cat or feeding a fish, while VR can, adding immersive value to this method of teaching. This assertion is further supported by a study conducted on the benefits of VR in a teaching environment, in which they found that VR eliminates distractions, focuses users, and is better for simulationary tasks (gupea).

Interactive Design

Author: Daniel

Story Board

The Pet Good interactions are necessary for this application to fulfil its pitch and overarching objectives. Pet Good is primarily a tool, such as how someone might utilise the various articles on purina for advice (), and for it to be an effective tool Pet Good needs to be informative, engaging, and possess real value to reinforce its marketability to potential pet owners. The interactions in Pet Good, such as feeding the bird and poking the start button to initialise the lesson at the user’s own leisure in the bird section. Engage the user by allowing them to be comfortable in and customise their environment/experience as they wish, helping the overall learning premise. This creates an experience in which an entire pet care scenario can be played out around them without the stresses and expectations of a normal pet interaction. Being able to grab, collide, and use objects as they can IRL will also intrigue users, while also teaching users not so familiar with VR the basics of how they can interact with the environment beyond simply reading tutorial text. This is further supported by research articles finding: “Research has shown that students are more motivated when using virtual reality in specific settings. In an article published in the International Journal of Emerging Technologies in Learning, medical students were most motivated when learning through virtual reality: it outperformed video and text-based learning settings.” (learntechlib.org).

VR is the correct interface to use in this learning experience, as it removes the need for imagination and removes the consequences of potential pet parental mistakes, all while providing a simulated experience that can’t be compared to simply reading about or watching a tutorial on the subject. This is due to VR creating a whole new reality around the user that changes as per user interaction. A video can’t make a user feel like they are petting a cat or feeding it, while VR can, adding immense immersive value to this method of teaching. This assertion is further supported by a study conducted upon the benefits of VR in a teaching environment, in which they found that VR eliminates distractions, focuses users, and is better for simulationary tasks (gupea).

In the bird care section, simulating the first interaction with your new pet bird, the user interacts with the experience in multiple stages. The first stage inserts the user into a home-like environment with introductory text and some blocks to pick up and move around. This is beneficial as it allows users to become familiar with the environment and teaches them skills such as using their hands correctly to touch objects useful for later stages. The next stage involves pressing the embark button to remove the introductory text and inserting the tutorial text over the top of it. This allows for the succinct transition of the user's attention and is also an easy to understand system, as buttons are prevalent in modern UI’s. The user then presses the start button to remove the tutorial text and load in the major chunk of the lesson. A bird in a cage appears with a surrounding audience and an accompanying task list. This task list gives the user advice on how to calmly interact with the bird, as well as the specific tasks to do before opening the cage. These include turning off the lights and removing the audience by poking them, and feeding the bird through the cage to show you are not a threat and to eliminate stressors. This is beneficial as you are physically doing it instead of purely reading about it. This affirms the knowledge in your mind, and as described in eLearningIdustry.com “these technologies can create simulations replicating real-life scenarios, allowing students to practice skills and learn from mistakes in a safe and controlled environment.”. 

When these tasks are complete, the cage is set to inactive, and the bird leaves the cage, following you wherever you go. This is crucial for the educational aspect, as positive feedback allows the user to know they are correctly interacting with the experience, helping them as they go forward. The bird leaving the cage is also intriguing for the user as it simulates what a happy bird might do IRL, and as such, might encourage users to be comfortable enough to buy an actual pet, which is the goal of Pet Good.

In the learning fish care section, the app simulates a user's first fish farming experience. When the user puts the new fish into the tank, there are two different buttons on the left and right sides of the tank. The button on the left side of the tank is a button that turns the light on and off. When users touch this button, they can see their fish more clearly. In addition, when the user touches the green button on the left, an instructional text in front of the fish tank will be displayed. By reading this text the user will learn the steps of raising fish. With these two interactive features, the app can create a real fish education experience that encourages users to buy a real fish.

In the Dog House Preparation Training section

RHandTrigger - Set target 

This allows the user to place a small target on any object surface in the world. Target will sit flush on the surface and stay once placed. 

RIndexTrigger - Analyse Target 

The user can analyse whatever object the target is touching. This displays a word space UI which is  positioned off the normal the surface is touching. The object name is displayed on UI or Hazard message depending on phase of the game.

A - Add to hazard List 

Adds the object the target is touching to hazard list.

B -  Remove from hazard list

Removes most recent entry from hazard list. 

X - Toggle UI 

Toggles which UI windows are displayed.

The interactions are also necessary, as they keep the users coming back. Each new lesson and pet becomes a potential new practice scenario, giving the users more than a five-minute experience they will then never touch again. This gives users the ability to experience a multitude of potential lessons on many subjects by pairing them with various environments and tasks, from helping users that have never seen a pet before to those that just need a refresher. These interactions therefore allow for an intermediary step between tutorials and actual exposure to pets, with the benefit of not being judged or an unsavoury event occuring due to a lack of experience.

Initial technical Development

VR

To give the user the most accurate representation of looking after their animal that we can currently achieve.

Unity

To create and manage interactions between objects in the VR scene.

Oculus Quest 2 

To view the VR scene

Oculus/Unity integration software (IDK which one) https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/integration/oculus-integration-82022

To create the VR scene to be viewed by the Oculus Quest

Oculus Link

To send the project to the headset (idk)

WiFi

To connect to the internet when we need to get resources or information.

Internet

Source of models and any code that we could find to cut corners.   We are programming, we don’t care about plagiarising.

Bluetooth

Connect headset to computer wirelessly (I didn’t want to include “wires” as an initial development technology.)

At this point, we have everything we need.   So if we were to add anything else we would need to spend multiple years as professionals in the industry in order to utilise them.   That being said, in this theoretical future we may potentially use…

Motion Capture suits for the animals.   (Like in STRAY)

Makes it more realistic, and allows for more dynamic animations.   (feels less static, easier to become attached.)

Full body motion tracking.

Make it as realistic as possible.   FULL HAND TRACKING (Yes you can flip the bird at your bird.)

Expert veterinary training.

So people don’t stress out people's bird by inviting over an audience to aggressively t-pose at it, lol.   (The joke will make sense later.)

Unreal Engine

Because Unity doesn’t look viable anymore.

More animals

Include other pet animals like spiders, horses, pigs, etc.

Expand scope to include other veterinary practices

E.g. diagnosing and treating common illnesses in pets.

Initial 3D Models

Dog house preparation training

https://poly.pizza/m/00f9MZIwA1V - Chess set | Jarlan Perez

https://poly.pizza/m/aoNcGMnNiG - Cable | Quaternius

https://poly.pizza/m/8kSHCCK66fa - Lego Moon Buggy | Ben Mitchell

https://poly.pizza/m/fBHV3AYiitX - Fireplace | Poly by Google

https://poly.pizza/m/8QtaCh2s3sm - Black Game Controller | Paul Spooner

https://poly.pizza/m/1PfSi8Y5J4u - Chocolate | Jeremy

https://poly.pizza/m/7JGnSIxgRVC - Grapes | Jarlan Perez

https://poly.pizza/m/5TDOcmDQlCV - Onions | Poly by Google

https://poly.pizza/m/1S8cp-PCpfJ - TIME HOTEL 2.15 | S. Paul Michael

https://poly.pizza/m/cAmECzmVE2_ - Watercolor Set | Don Carson

https://poly.pizza/m/2jFwyCzAAaP - Toy train | Jair Trejo

https://poly.pizza/m/vlVx279xut - Trashcan | Quaternius

https://poly.pizza/m/n88WAcjzTv - Window Small | Quaternius

https://poly.pizza/m/y4wdQpg767 - Shiba Inu | Quaternius

https://poly.pizza/bundle/Ultimate-Interior-Props-Pack-9KfkK2H0ve - Ultimate Interior Props Pack | Zsky

https://poly.pizza/bundle/Ultimate-Food-Pack-h3WC1gyRb4 - Ultimate Food Pack | Quaternius

Bird Training

Fish Care Leaning

Conclusion 

In conclusion, Pet good aims to teach valuable lessons to up and coming pet owners who might be in need of lessons to care for their pet, but can’t afford to learn from an expert directly, or can’t easily learn from other media. 

These people will develop the skills required to care for their desired pet, without risk of harming themselves, or their pet. This will give would be pet owners a taste of real situations in which their pet might suffer if they don’t know how to deal with it.

Also, it might show some people that caring for pets can be challenging, and not something for them, potentially saving them money, time, and effort. These principles uphold what we believe in here at petgood™©®. 

Thanks for reading :) 

References

Ed.D, J.E. (2023). Immersive Learning: How Virtual And Augmented Reality Are Transforming Higher Education. [online] eLearning Industry. Available at: https://elearningindustry.com/immersive-learning-how-virtual-and-augmented-reali... [Accessed 3 Oct. 2023].

Hussein, M. and Nätterdal, C. (2015). The Benefits of Virtual Reality in Education A Comparison Study. [online] Available at: https://gupea.ub.gu.se/bitstream/handle/2077/39977/gupea_2077_39977_1.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y.

Sattar, M., Palaniappan, S., Lokman, A., Shah, N., Khalid, U. and Hasan, R. (2020). Motivating Medical Students Using Virtual Reality Based Education. International Journal of Emerging Technologies in Learning (iJET), [online] 15(2), pp.160–174. Available at: https://www.learntechlib.org/p/217172/.

www.i3-technologies.com. (n.d.). VR in the classroom: benefits and drawbacks. [online] Available at: https://www.i3-technologies.com/en/blog/stories/education/vr-in-the-classroom-be... [Accessed 3 Oct. 2023].

www.purina.co.uk. (n.d.). Pet Care Articles and Advice From The Pet Experts | Purina. [online] Available at: https://www.purina.co.uk/articles [Accessed 3 Oct. 2023].

Lin, C, Faas, T & Brady, E 2017, ‘Exploring affection-oriented virtual pet game design strategies in VR attachment, motivations and expectations of users of pet games’, 2017 Seventh International Conference on Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction (ACII), Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction (ACII), 2017 Seventh International Conference on, pp. 362–369, viewed 4 October 2023, <https: research.ebsco.com="" linkprocessor="" plink?id="25d7d483-5589-3dbd-8b29-27edb96f7dea">. </https:>

Toggle Light Switch Behaviour Script:

https://mylo.utas.edu.au/d2l/common/dialogs/quickLink/quickLink.d2l?ou=598980&ty...

 Show Text Script: 

https://chat.openai.com/share/b4976a65-7014-4324-bced-159744b33a45

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