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title: Reality Media
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<div class="logged-in"><h4><em>Development of the Immersive version of the book is behind due to pandemic-related delays, but some spaces are available.
  Additional content will be added through mid-2022.</em></h4>
</div>
  <p></p>
    <div class="right-side">
      <a class="exlink" href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/reality-media"><img src="{{ site.baseurl_book_img }}/mit-press-image.png" style="width: 100%" ></img></a>
    </div>

    <p>
      This digital version of <i>Reality Media</i> is a complement to the printed book (shown to the right). The digital version has both 2D and 3D forms.
      The 2D and 3D sites are organized as a collection of galleries; in the 2D site these are pages, and in the 3D site they are 3D spaces that allow you to get inside AR and VR—to inhabit these new reality media. Each of the 2D pages has a corresponding immersive 3D gallery space.
    </p>

    <div class="not-logged-in">
      <p>
        In order to enter the immersive 3D galleries yourself, you will need to first create an account and login. If you would like to browse the 2D site without creating an account, please visit <a class="exlink" href="/index-not-logged-in.html">this page</a>.
      </p>          

      <hr>
      <h4 class="collapsible">Click for Instructions to sign in to the 3D site</h4>
      <div>
        <p><span style="color: red;">As you go through these steps, please be sure to keep this tab open so you can return to it when you are done.</span> When you return, you may need to refresh the page for it to show that you are signed on in the menu bar at the top of the screen.</p>
        <h5>Step 1</h5>
        <p>
          Enter your email on our immersive 3D site <a class="exlink" href="https://xr.realitymedia.digital/signin" target="_blank">xr.realitymedia.digital</a>. 
        </p> 
        <p>
          <img src="{{ site.baseurl_img }}/login-emailflow.png" class="center" ></img></a>
        </p>
        <h5>Step 2</h5>
        <p>
          Check your email for the verification email you should receive.  If you don't see it, be sure to check your Junk Mail folder.
        </p>
        <p>
          <img src="{{ site.baseurl_img }}/login-link.jpeg" class="center"  ></img></a>
        </p>
        <h5>Step 3</h5>
        <p>
          When you click on the URL in the email, a new browser window or tab should open and let you know verification is complete. You can close this window or tab.
        </p>
        <p>
          <img src="{{ site.baseurl_img }}/login-verified.png" class="center" ></img></a>
        </p>      
        <h5>Step 4</h5>
        <p>
          The window or tab where you entered your email should show that you are signed in to xr.realitymedia.digital.  You can close this window or tab.
        </p>
        <p>
          <img src="{{ site.baseurl_img }}/login-done.png" class="center"  ></img></a>
        </p> 
      </div>
      <hr>
      <h4 class="collapsible">Research projects</h4>
      <div>
        <h5>RealityMedia: Immersive technology and Narrative space</h5>
         <div>
           <h6>Abstract</h6>
           <p>The practice and theory of VR narrative are usually understood in relation to and as developing out of the tradition of 3D videogames and other interactive digital forms, and these in turn are often understood on the model of oral storytelling. There is another lineage in which VR narrative can be approached: as a new form of writing or inscription. In this tradition, constructing VR narratives is a process of inscribing narrative or ideational elements in space, and consuming the narrative becomes a process of reading the space rather than listening. In this paper, we explore VR as a new writing space in the long tradition since inscription on wood and stone and on the later media of papyrus roll, codex, and printed book. Because VR is inherently spatial and immersive, we also look to the historical spaces in which artifacts and texts are organized in space: the library and in recent centuries the museum. In our current project we are focusing on the museum as a model, because a museum typically contains various media forms (objects, texts, images in various media, and often videos). Museums are writing spaces with multiple forms of inscriptions, and, as various theorists have noticed, museums contain a complex of interwoven narrative lines: stories that may be embodied in a single object on display supported by wall copy or may extend throughout a gallery or throughout an entire theme-oriented museum. 
              <br /> <br />
    In considering a VR space as affording a new kind of book, we see that, as opposed to the linear space of a printed book, the narratives embodied in a physical space like a museum can be analyzed on three distinct levels: (1) the architecture of the space itself, (2) the collection, and (3) the individual artifacts. The levels can present multiple narrative threads. From this perspective, the problem becomes how to organize and present elements at each level in order to facilitate the “reading” of the various threads by the visitor/user/reader. How can VR address this task, both by remediating strategies familiar from physical museums and the various media contained within them and by offering new affordances not available to brick and mortar, glass and steel museums?
            </p>
          </div>
        <h5>Welcome to the Metaverse: Investigating Users' Mental Models behind Hyperspatial Navigation in VR</h5>
        <div>
          <h6>Abstract</h6>
          <p>This study presents a VR application, RealityMedia, that uses hyperspatial linking (linking between 2D and 3D spaces) to demonstrate how WebXR technology can be used to effectively merge immersive 3D environments with conventional 2D websites. The system allows a VR headset user to navigate between the 2D website and immersive 3D spaces on their web browser by traversing the hyperlinks through hyperspatial navigation on both 2D and 3D displays. To understand the users’ mental models and perceptual and cognitive processes involved in hyperspatial navigation, we logged their activity and conducted semi-structured interviews. We identified three patterns in the users’ perception of the relationship between the 2D and 3D spaces in relation to their navigational performance and mental shift: 3D and 2D, 3D in 2D, and 2D in 3D. We discuss the implication of these results and offer suggestions about how hyperspatial navigation could be better supported in information spaces.</p>
        </div>
    </div>
     <hr>
    </div>
<!--
      <p>
        Here is a video preview of one of the 3D immersive galleries (a virtual Acropolis), to give you an idea of how it works:
      </p>
      <p>
        <div style="width:100%;height:0px;position:relative;padding-bottom:51.446%;"><iframe src="https://streamable.com/e/c4oso2" frameborder="0" width="100%" height="100%" allowfullscreen style="width:100%;height:100%;position:absolute;left:0px;top:0px;overflow:hidden;"></iframe></div>
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<div class="logged-in">
      <!--Below is the group of image blocks (3 rows/4colums) that link into the gallery web pages and another group below that for 
      extra information e.g. authors and credits-->
      <p>
      The <a class="exlink" href="/preface/">Preface</a> explains the concept behind the project and gives an overview of the structure of the 2D and 3D spaces, and how they relate to the chapters in the printed book.
    </p>
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      <!-- <div style="width:35%; float: right;"> -->
        <div class="right-side">
        <img src="{{ site.baseurl_book_img }}/ch-preface/Map_transparent.png" style="width: 100%" >
        </div>

 <p>
        The immersive galleries of <em>RealityMedia</em> are organized around a central rotunda.  The rotunda contains an overview of each immersive gallery along with a portal to each gallery. The rotunda serves as an organizational hub and can be accessed from each of the immersive galleries.
      </p>
      <p>
        Links to the 2D galleries of <em>RealityMedia</em> are listed below. These pages provide context for your visit as well as links into the corresponding 3D galleries (the portal symbol <i class="fas fa-vr-cardboard"></i> indicates a link into a 3D gallery). 
      </p>
      <p class="centered">We encourage you to enter the 3D galleries from the 2D pages below, but if you want to go directly to the 3D spaces, you should begin the 3D experience in the <a class="xrlink" room="0" waypoint="onboarding">Arrival Hall</a> onboarding area, through which you can access the Rotunda.</p>

      <p class="centered">After you are familiar with the experience you can go directly to the <a class="xrlink" room="0" waypoint="start">Rotunda</a>.
      </p>
    
    
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