A cross-platform, remotely-controlled mobile avatar simulation framework for AmI environments

Abstract

Nowadays, users are able to interact with digital content using their mobile devices almost everywhere and anytime due to the increased power, portability, and ubiquitous connectivity of mobile devices. This paper presents the design and implementation of a novel, remotely controlled for the purposes of edutainment and instructor-student interaction, three-dimensional full body avatar gamification framework. The main innovation introduced focuses on multi-presence gamified educational scenarios in multiple desktop computers and mobile devices. Thus the remotely-controlled avatar can act as a guide, assistant or information presenter for novel, cross-platform Ambient Intelligence (AmI) edutainment scenarios. In detail, the avatar's role depends on the requirements of the AmI client applications as these are propagated remotely (using remote procedure calls). Examples of remote function invocations include real-time 3D biped skinned animations, text-to-speech, producing facial expressions and presenting multimedia content.