Virtual Reality Brings Flat Images Into 3-D Focus for UA Geology Students

Students wearing 3-D glasses in a Geology 101 laboratory at UA view virtual reality-style images courtesy a new visualization center. (Jessica Maxwell)
Students wearing 3-D glasses in a Geology 101 laboratory at UA view virtual reality-style images courtesy a new visualization center. (Jessica Maxwell)

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Imagine a world where maps no longer lay flat and lifeless on a desk, but instead appear in three-dimensional clarity while “floating” in the center of the room.

That’s a world that professional geoscientists have lived in for several years as they’ve used virtual reality devices in navigating the ocean’s floor or deciding the precise location to drill for oil. And now, thanks to the construction of a new visualization center in Smith Hall, it’s a world to which students taking geological science courses at The University of Alabama have been granted access. UA is one of the first universities in the Southeast to bring the virtual reality technology, known as a GeoWall, into a teaching computer lab.

“A lot of students have trouble taking a 2-D map and visualizing a three-dimensional image,” said Dr. Andrew Goodliffe, assistant professor of geological sciences, who teaches an introduction to geology course at UA. “Hopefully, the system will help students get a much better understanding.” The technology is debuting this summer in labs which correspond with the introductory course Goodliffe is teaching.

The heart of the GeoWall system is two DLP, or digital light processing, projectors mounted on the ceiling of a Smith Hall laboratory. The projectors, equipped with polarizing filters, project dual images – offset ever so slightly – onto a special screen. The system, which includes 3-D glasses worn by those wishing to view the virtual reality imagery, “tricks” the eyes and the brain into interpreting the images as three-dimensional, Goodliffe says.

In a recent demonstration, Goodliffe uses the system’s joystick to conduct a “flyover,” which gives the viewer the impression he is soaring above a tangible topographic image of the state of Alabama, weaving in and out of a series of volcanoes, or viewing the point of earthquake origins underneath the globe’s surface.

The UA visualization center also includes 12 PCs with 17-inch LCD flat panel monitors. “We have various lab exercises that will go along with these visualizations,” Goodliffe said.

Students who will later work as professional geoscientists will regularly use similar, albeit even more advanced, technology in their careers. Goodliffe, in his own field work, sometimes uses this type of technology to navigate remotely operated vehicles along the ocean’s floor.

“We use these visualizations to maneuver things like submersibles across the sea floor,” he said. “If you go work in the oil industry, this is the sort of technology they will use to try and visualize the geology.”

More than 60 students taking a Geology 101 laboratory this summer are getting an early taste of the lab which will be fully integrated into the curriculum in the fall. The experience can later be expanded to include virtual reality tours of the solar system and other aspects of possible interest to those outside geology, Goodliffe says. Dual cameras may later be purchased so that any image photographed can be brought back to the lab and shared with students in all its life-like wonder.

Most of the students taking the introductory classes are not geology majors. “We are primarily aiming this facility at non-majors,” said Goodliffe, who teaches within the College of Arts and Sciences. “That’s one of the things that sets our use of the GeoWall apart from other universities.

Outfitting the new visualization center, including remodeling the room, purchasing computers and furniture, as well as the GeoWall equipment, cost approximately $60,000, said Dr. Harold Stowell, professor and chair of geological sciences. About one-third of the cost was paid for with interest from an endowed fund, made possible by alumni activities.

Job demands for portions of the geological sciences’ field is booming, particularly petroleum geologists, a field involving oil and natural gas recovery, and economic geologists, those involved in the mining of precious metals, base metals and sand and gravel. The average salary for a petroleum geologist with less than two years experience was listed as $74,400, according to a survey in the April 2006 edition of an American Association of Petroleum Geologists publication. The average for those holding a doctorate, and with the same limited experience, was listed as $82,500.

UA expects to later join a GeoWall consortium, www.geowall.org, a loosely connected group of organizations using the technology. In addition to providing a more effective instructional environment, Goodliffe says the technology can help prospective students better see the excitement and varied opportunities that a career in geology can offer.

“Students don’t naturally gravitate toward geology,” Goodliffe said, “so we really have to sell ourselves. They think all we do is look at rocks.”

Contact

Chris Bryant, Assistant Director of Media Relations, 205/348-8323, cbryant@ur.ua.edu

Source

Dr. Andrew Goodliffe, 205/348-7167 or
amg@ua.edu
Dr. Harold Stowell, hstowell@geo.ua.edu