VEIV Students

I studied at UCL for my MEng in Computer Science, graduating Summer 2015. I then worked as a software developer in Formula One before starting my PhD with the department March 2016. I'm supervised by Anthony Steed.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Redirected Walking | Virtual Reality | Augmented Reality | Computer Graphics

Thomas Pearce is an architectural designer (B.Sc., TU Berlin, MArch, Bartlett UCL) and cultural historian (B.A., M.A, KU Leuven). He has worked extensively in architectural practice as a specialist for digital design and fabrication and has published peer-reviewed theoretical work on the architecture of the proto-internet, the aesthetics and materiality of data landscapes and on the concept of sub-optimisation in digital fabrication.

Primary Supervisor: Peg Rawes

Second Supervisor: Nat Chard

Digital Fabrication | 3D Scanning | Simulation | Built Environment

I am a doctoral student based in the UCL Interaction Centre (UCLIC), funded through the VEIV centre. I began my studies at UCL in October 2014.

Primary Supervisor: Duncan Brumby

Industry Sponsor: BBC R&D

Media Multitasking | Interruptions | Immersion | Film | Television

Christodoulos has a major in Music Studies (University of Athens), a Master of Arts in Music Performance (Royal Academy of Music – London) and Master of Research Degree in Computer Science (UCL – VEIV).

Primary Supervisor: Nicolas Gold

Industry Sponsor: Penny Dreadful Productions

Research Area: Goes here

Information coming soon

Primary Supervisor: Ljiljana Marjanovic-Halburd

Industry Sponsor: BSRIA

Research Area: TBC

Awarded VEIV EngD

I have had the good fortune of a fully funded position, working within the UK National Health Service (NHS) to deliver service improvements. Supported access to a number of nationalised projects has enabled me to analyse project, purchasing behaviour and people interface in the largest UK NHS Trust.

Primary Supervisor: Michael Pitt

Industry Sponsor : Barts Health NHS Trust

Public Health | Service Management | Procurement | End Users

Hannah studied for an MSci in Geoscience as an undergrad at Royal Holloway but discovered her interest in dimensional measurement and metrology when she studied for an MSc in Land Surveying at UCL. She worked as a land surveyor before starting her EngD.

Primary Supervisor: Stuart Robson

Industry Sponsor: NPL

Metrology | XCT | Dimensional Measurements | Traceability

Stathis holds a diploma of civil and environmental engineering and master degrees in sustainability and computational engineering. As part of his engineering doctorate he examines computational methods that assist decision-makers understand the relationships between engineering and managerial sustainable multi-performance indexes by combining the capabilities of intelligent decision-making tools, quality functions and optimisation algorithms.

Primary Supervisor: Dejan Mumovic

Industry Sponsor: Price & Myers

Structural optimisation | Building information models | Life cycle performance | Multi-criteria decision making

James is an EngD student at University College London where he is advised by Prof. Niloy Mitra in the Smart Geometry group. His research interests are broadly in the areas of computer graphics, human-computer interaction and computer vision.

Primary Supervisor: Niloy Mitra

Computer Graphics | Imaging | HCI | Computer Vision

Drew’s research, in collaboration with the BBC, is focused on cinematic virtual reality and its potential to create immersive experiences in the living room. Aspects being explored include the creation and editing of 360-degree video, such as the image processing steps required for effective post-production. 

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: BBC

Cinematic Virtual Reality | 360-degree Video | Immersive Displays | Image Processing | Computational Photography

Research Website

Joep is currently in his fourth and final year of the MRes+EngD program, and has just gotten his first paper at the Eurographics conference accepted. Before starting at UCL he briefly worked for Vision Semantics, where he maintained computer vision algorithms in Matlab and C++.

Primary Supervisor: Tim Weyrich

Industry Sponsor: P&G

Texture synthesis | Face and skin capture | Blend shape modelling

Yair worked as an Architect before joining the UCL Centre for Virtual Environments, Interaction and Visualisation, and is now working on a research project entitled ‘Creative Reuse: The Life Cycle Carbon Footprint and Life Cycle Cost of Refurbished and New Buildings.

Primary Supervisor: Dejan Mumovic

Industry Sponsor: Hawkins\Brown

Generative Design | Optimisation | Life Cycle Analysis | Life Cycle Carbon Footprint | Building Performance

Doctoral researcher working with the Bartlett and Computer Science departments on quantifying and mitigating the discrepancy between predicted and measured energy use in buildings, his work is sponsored and guided by BuroHappold Engineering a global engineering consultancy.

Primary Supervisor: Dejan Mumovic

Industry Sponsor: Sponsored by Buro Happold

Energy Performance Gap | Building Simulationm | Energy Quantification

David studied Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Warwick. He then completed his MRes in Virtual Environments, Imaging and Visualisation at UCL in 2015, and is currently studying towards an EngD at the VEIV Centre. From January to August 2016, David completed a research internship at the National Institute of Informatics in Tokyo, Japan.

Primary Supervisor: Prof Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: Imagination Technologies Ltd

Augmented Reality | Computer Graphics | 3D Reconstruction

Kelvin studied an MSc in Geographic Information Science at UCL before working as a GIS analyst at WSP Group. His research is focused on 3D GIS and data quality issues with a particular focus on semantic and feature content and descriptions. 

Primary Supervisor: Claire Ellul

Industry Sponsor: Sponsored by Ordnance Survey

Geographic Information | 3D GIS | 3D data quality | 3D usability | 3D applications

AWARDED VEIV ENGD

Martin Dittus studied computing in Berlin, worked as a software developer and project manager at the Internet startup Last.fm, and was awarded a master's degree at the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis (CASA) at UCL. He is currently completing his doctorate at the ICRI Cities at UCL.

Primary Supervisor: Licia Capra

Industry Sponsor: Intel

Crowdsourcing | Crowd Mapping | Community Engagement | Computational Social Science | Data Science

I am interested in issues regarding Human Factors, particularly topics that involve automation, decision aiding and visualization.

Primary Supervisor: John Dowell

Industry Sponsor: Land Registry

Research Area: Human Factors

Awarded VEIV EngD

My interests are in high performance computing & communication systems, novel hardware, and all aspects of building high fidelity virtual worlds. My main research theme and topic of my EngD is low latency rendering for synthetic environments. 

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: Maxeler

High Performance Computing | Low Latency | Virtual Reality | Realtime Rendering

I am a studying computer vision under the supervision of Gabriel Brostow. In 2012 I obtained a MSc in Computer Graphics, Vision and Imaging from UCL and a Masters of Engineering from Supélec. I am quite interested by 3D reconstruction, Image-based rendering, Computational photography and deep learning.

Primary Supervisor: Gabe Brostow

3d Reconstruction | Machine Vision | Deep Learning

Valentina is a research engineer in building physics with a background in thermo-mechanical engineering. Her main research focuses on moisture transfer within internally insulated solid walls. She worked on the research and development of an internal wall insulation system, using laboratory experiments and in-situ measurements.

Primary Supervisor: Hector Altamirano-Medina

Industry Sponsor: Natural Building Technologies

Building physics | Thermo-Mechanics | Natural Building Technologies

Awarded VEIV EngD

Adaptive and responsive architecture is an area of research offering a plethora of opportunities to improve the built environment and occupant comfort. Specifically, system learning provides a vehicle by which a user can inadvertently tailor a buildings function according to their needs, wants and natural habits.

Primary Supervisor: Michael Pitt

Industry Sponsor : Modus

Adaptive and Responsive Architecture

Daniel joins the EngD from itmsoil, a company providing structural monitoring systems to the construction sector, where he was involved in sensor design, testing and calibration, on-site installation, system design, and data analysis. His experience spans rail, dams, towers, tunnels and other major infrastructure works, including the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, Heathrow Terminal 5, Thameslink upgrade, Victoria Station Upgrade and, most recently working as a project manager on Crossrail contract C701.

Primary Supervisor: Jan Boehm

Induatry Sponsor: ITMSoil

Monitoring | Sensors | Web-based Data Visualisation | Automated Total Stations

Awarded VEIV EngD

In partnership with Skanska, and under the supervision of Professor Michael Pitt and Peter McLennan, my research focuses on the investigation of fault detection, diagnosis and prognosis on mechanical and electrical building assets via numerous sensors and systems for efficient and innovative asset management in order toaddress the problem of asset failure and reduce costly reactive maintenance efforts.

Primary Supervisor: Michael Pitt

Industry Sponsor: Skanska

Life Cycle Assessment | Built Environment

The current state of the art in image super-resolution relies on interpolation and patch-based approaches and stops at a few orders of magnitude. This project poses the pertinent question of what lies between the pixels of an image and how we could infer or "hallucinate" appropriate content to fill those spaces at much greater orders of magnitude.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed 

Industry Sponsor: Anthropics

Enhanced Vision

Awarded VEIV EngD

A state-of-the-art THZ pulsed semiconductor-based imaging system has been developed by Teraview specifically to monitor the thickness, uniformity and density of laminar and coated structures and to identify structural features such as cracks, dislocations and delaminations.

Primary Supervisor: Matija Strlic

Industry Sponsor: TerraView

Enhanced Vision 

I am a research graduate in the department of computer science, University College London. I have come to academia from an industry in metrology, working in new concepts for real-time controllers at Renishaw PLC. 

Primary Supervisor: Steve Hailes

Industry Sponsor: Renishaw

Hardware and Design

An Imaging Tool for Energy Efficient Communities of the Future

The depletion of fuel reserves and the concerns on the energy security that stem from it, sustainable development and global warming have increased the focus on the efficiency of the generation and delivery of the energy to the communities. In this scenario, renewable energy technologies and district heating are considered to be a very efficient form of generation and distribution of energy, offering the potential for considerable savings of carbon.

Supervisor1: Supervisor 1 here

Sponsor Name: British Research Establishment (BRE)

Research Area: An Imaging Tool for Energy Efficient Communities of the Future

Traditionally, computer graphics aim at creating digital descriptions of how real-world materials reflect light.

Primary Supervisor: Tim Weyrich

Industry Sponsor: ArkaSoft

Intelligent Materials

The goal of my EngD project is to investigate methods of realistically integrating virtually rendered content within real scenes. Achieving convincing results require knowing information about the real scene: at the very minimum it requires knowing the lighting conditions of the scene. 

Primary Supervisor: Prof Jan Kautz

Industry Sponsor: Disney Research

Inverse lighting | Augmented Reality | Geometry Optimisation | 3D Printing

The research is framed in the general ExCites ‘Extreme Citizen Science’ research group which is aimed to extend the range of applications, participation and engagement of people in citizen science projects. 

Primary Supervisor: Muki Haklay

Industry Sponsor: Zoological Society of London

System Interaction

My areas of research are character rigging and simulation as well as real-time animation.

ROYAL COMMISSION FOR THE EXHIBITION OF 1851 INDUSTRIAL FELLOW

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: Passion Pictures

Dynamic Environments

Increasing urbanisation and projected climate change have led to the need for enhanced design guidance for the built environment. Designers and planners need to be aware of the effects that urban climates will have on the performance of their buildings.

Primary Supervisor: Mike Davies

Industry Sponsor: CIBSE

The Urban Climate – An Integrated Approach to Building Performance and Urban Design

Awarded VEIV EngD

David Andreen is developing physiomimetic design strategies for 3D printed buildings

Primary Supervisor: Sean Hanna

Industry Sponsor: FreeForm Construction

Intelligent Design | Spatial Design for Additive Manufacturing

The aim of my project is to give game design artists better 3D references and scene reconstructions which can be directly fed into the creative pipeline. 

Primary Supervisor: Tim Weyrich

Industry Sponsor : Disney Interactive

3D References for Scene Contructions

My research concerns the visual experience of architecture and urban space. I will be exploring the use of machine perception to understand how visual factors influence spatial awareness. 

Primary Supervisor: Sean Hanna

Industry Sponsor: Foster + Partners

Architectural Systems Design

Yotam Doron's project aims to develop efficient techniques for automatically editing and analysing digital film. The main areas of interest are colour grading, disparity mapping and focus detection.

Primary Supervisor: Jan Kautz

Industry Sponsor: The Foundry

Enhanced Vision | Automated Editing of Digital Film

David di Duca's work investigates ideas relating to affordance, human-nonhuman interaction and cybernetics. He undertakes his research through building interactive test pieces.

Primary Supervisor: Stephen Gage

Industry Sponsor: Jason Bruges Studio

Systems Interactions | Spatial Observation Monitoring

Awarded VEIV EngD

I am researching the cases for refurbishment and replacement of existing buildings to improve whole life cycle energy consumption and reduce carbon emissions. The energy performance of an old building is typically poorer than that of newer buildings.

Primary Supervisor: Dejan Mumovic

Industry Sponsor: Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios

Dynamic Environments | Life-Cycle Building Performance

Awarded VEIV MRes

An understanding of interconnected and complex hydrological systems is necessary for sustainable water management and engineering solutions, especially in light of global environmental change.

Primary Supervisor: Jon French

Industry Sponsor: Halcrow

Visualising Flood Management

Awarded VEIV EngD

John's research is concerned with both the technical aspects of scanning museum objects, and the use of those scans in a physical or virtual exhibition space.

Primary Supervisor: Melissa Terras

Industry Sponsor: The Science Museum

Systems Interactions | Interactive Museum Systems | Virtual Capturing | Terrestial Scanning

Awarded VEIV EngD

Kazim's research deals with digitally restoring parchments with fire damage. The particular parchment book (the Great Parchment Book) is an extremely important document that fell victim to this very form of damage. 

Primary Supervisor: Melissa Terras

Industry Sponsor: London Metropolitan Archives

Enhanced Vision | Reconstruction of Damaged Documents

Awarded VEIV EngD

In collaboration with Aedas R&D and UCL, my research will explore the use of advanced modelling at the early stages of design, utilising performance data and environmental simulation as architectural design drivers.

Primary Supervisor: Dejan Mumovic

Industry Sponsor: Adeas

Dynamic Environments | Environmental Factors in Integrated Workflow

Awarded VEIV EngD

The Thameslink Project involves a £5 billion upgrade of a major railway line through Central London. The protection of existing buildings and activities as well as major transport infrastructure hubs is essential to making such developments sustainable as transport solutions. Anita Soni researches key issues for the application of new spatial measurement techniques.

Primary Supervisor: Stuart Robson

Industry Sponsor: Network Rail

Enhanced Vision | Information Visualisation for Railways

Awarded VEIV EngD

PLP Research is focused on providing better tools for architects and engineers to predict behaviour of complex systems, such as the built environment. The control of geometric form has been the focus of current parametric design systems.

Primary Supervisor: Sean Hanna

Industry Sponsor: PLP Architecture

Dynamic Environments | Parametric Sustainable Design

Awarded VEIV EngD

The main aim of this project is to quantitatively determine the operational performance of newly built, low-energy schools. This will be achieved by examining discrepancies between the design and the actual building in four predominant areas; building energy performance, building systems installation, building use, and the internal environment performance. 

Primary Supervisor: Dejan Mumovic

Industry Sponsor: Feilden Clegg Bradley

Performance of Low-Energy Buildings

Awarded VEIV EngD

Sarat currently leads materials research with BREAD in collaboration with UCL via the Engineering Doctorate scheme setup by the EPSRC. He is looking at new variable materials and exploring their production, potential and design.

ROYAL COMMISSION FOR THE EXHIBITION OF 1851 INDUSTRIAL FELLOW

Primary Supervisor: Sean Hanna

Industry Sponsor: BREAD (The Bureau of Research Engineering Art & Design)

Intelligent Materials | Modeling Hybrid Materials

Awarded VEIV EngD

Under the supervision of Prof. Anthony Steed and in cooperation with Arup, I am looking into large scale distribution of real-time 3D architectural geometry and network streaming while investigating the ad-hoc visibility and various culling methods trying to improve on the performance limiting the network bandwidth requirements.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: Arup

Dynamic Environments | Real-time Architectural Geometry

Awarded VEIV EngD

I work on Structure Sensitive Inpainting under the supervision of Dr Gabriel Brostow and in collaboration with Anthropics Technology Ltd.

Primary Supervisor: Gabe Brostow

Industry Sponsor: Anthropics

Research Area: Goes here

Awarded VEIV EngD

I am working under supervision of Prof. David Hawkes on respiratory motion compensation of lung tumours.

ROYAL COMMISSION FOR THE EXHIBITION OF 1851 INDUSTRIAL FELLOW

Primary Supervisor: David Hawkes

Industry Sponsor  Vision RT

Enhanced Vision | Respiratory Motion Compensation

My background is in Computer Science and Machine Learning, and I plan to apply Machine Learning and probabilistic methods to long-standing vision problems. In particular, I'm looking at the problem of how to reconstruct a 3D model from video footage of the interior of a building.

Primary Supervisor: Gabe Brostow

Vision and Machine Learning 

Awarded VEIV EngD

Natural systems provide unique examples of computation in a form very different from contemporary computer architectures. Biology demonstrates capabilities such as adaptation, self-repair and self-organisation that are increasingly desirable for our technology. 

Primary Supervisor: Peter J. Bentley

Industry Sponsor: Toumaz Technology Ltd

Hardware and Design | Systematic computation architecture

This project is focused on the development of a digital skin model that should be capable of expressing, to the highest degree of reality possible, the visual appearance of human skin, which depends upon a variety of anatomical, physiological and external parameters. Applications for such a model might be in the entertainment and cosmetics industries.

ROYAL COMMISSION FOR THE EXHIBITION OF 1851 INDUSTRIAL FELLOW

Primary Supervisor: Tim Weyrich

Industry Sponsor: Proctor & Gamble

Animated Bodies | Human Skin Rendering

Awarded VEIV MPhil

I am working on the project "Photogrammetry of Buildings" in cooperation with Framestore. We are working on a system that allows the user to quickly reconstruct buildings of any shape and form, with the help of a sequence of images that have been taken of the building.

Primary Supervisor: Jan Kautz

Industry Sponsor: Framestore

Dynamic Environments | Simplify 3D Reconstruction

Awarded VEIV EngD

Computational Statistics and Machine Learning for Proteomic Profile Analysis

Development of computational statistics and machine learning strategies for the selection of relevant patterns within proteomic profiles of infectious disease processes. 

Primary Supervisor: John Shawe-Taylor

Industry Sponsor: NIMR

Medical Modeling

Awarded VEIV MSc

Distributed Tracking and Situation Assessment: 

The aim of this research project is to develop new algorithms that allow information fusion to occur in a distributed fashion over a network of mobile sensing platforms. 

Primary Supervisor: Simon Julier

Industry Sponsor: BAE Systems

Site Selection of Nuclear Waste

Awarded VEIV EngD

Research project: Psychotherapeutic uses of avatars, agents and virtual environments.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed 

Industry Sponsor: Anthropia

Virtual Environments | Avatars/Agents | Neuropsychology and Affect Science

Awarded VEIV EngD

Interaction networks are made up of nodes, representing people, and links representing observed interactions between them. Within such networks community structures have been observed where nodes are more densely connected within communities than across communities. 

Primary Supervisor: Simon Julier

Industry Sponsor: BAE Systems

Dynamic Environments | Community Networks

Awarded VEIV EngD  

EngD VEIV candidate and 1851 Industrial Fellow, Jess Wardlaw, and supervisor Prof Muki Haklay, discuss her research in health provision mapping. This important area of visual engineering is set to enhance the efficiency of healthcare management in increasingly complex and demanding environments.

ROYAL COMMISSION FOR THE EXHIBITION OF 1851 INDUSTRIAL FELLOW

Primary Supervisor: Muki Haklay

Industry Sponsor: Dr Foster Intelligence

System Interactions | Epidemiological Mapping

Awarded VEIV EngD

Web-based SDSS for site selection of nuclear waste repository in the UK; and stakeholder consultation.

Primary Supervisor: Tao Cheng

Industry Sponsor: Arup Geotechnical

System Interactions | Geomatic Engineering

Awarded VEIV EngD

This project will explore the hypothesis of graphical modelling of design as an integration strategy for the management of building construction projects. It is planned to develop in two stages: The first one will investigate geometrical modelling as the pivot for determinants of architectural design, such as sustainability and planning principles.

Primary Supervisor: Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: 3DReid

Dynamic Environments | Architectural Geometric Modelling

Awarded VEIV EngD

This project aims to explore the possibilities of video-based rendering to enable arbitrary camera viewpoints for applications such as sports matches.

Primary Supervisor: Jan Kautz

Industry Sponsor: BBC

Enhanced Vision | Computer Vision

Awarded VEIV EngD

In October 2009 Mojtaba Bahrami won a Student Paper Award (in an international competition)  from the U.S. Institution of Navigation (ION) to present his work at the ION GNSS 2009 conference, the 22nd International Technical Meeting of the Satellite Division of the U.S. Institute of Navigation, in September 22-25 in Savannah, Georgia.

Primary Supervisor: Marek Ziebart

Industry Sponsor: Ordnance Survey

System Interactions | Improvement to kinematic GPS

Awarded VEIV EngD

The investigation of tools, technology and software useful to the design process that can draw directly on information obtained in real-time from a prospective and/or actual site.

Primary Supervisor: Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: Buro Happold

Intelligent Materials | Component-based modelling

Awarded VEIV EngD

The investigation of tools, technology and software useful to the design process that can draw directly on information obtained in real-time from a prospective and/or actual site.

Primary Supervisor: Stephen Gage

Industry Sponsor: Haque Design + Research Ltd

Design Instruments | Intelligent Materials | Design Process

Awarded VEIV EngD

My research aims are to design and develop tools and strategies that use technology to encourage the development of a sense of place through increasing people's feeling of connection with their physical location, and to investigate how this can be extended into a sense of community.

Primary Supervisor: Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: BT Research and Venturing

Hardware and Design | Sense of place in public spaces

Awarded VEIV EngD

This project is concerned with GIS, GPS and Vision data fusion. There is no way at present to indicate the relationship between roads, buildings and other features which a traveler sees with those described by GNSS position and GIS data.

Peimary Supervisor: Simon Prince

Industry Sponsor: Sharp Laboratories Europe

Computer Vision | Enhanced Vision

Awarded VEIV EngD

My research builds upon a previous project in collaboration with the foreign direct investment promotion agency Think London, where I developed a Geographical Information System for the agency. Through the EngD I will continue this collaboration and develop more advanced analysis and visualisation tools for the promotion of inward investment in London.

Primary Supervisor: David Chapman

Industry Sponsor: ThinkLondon

GIS modelling for company location decisions

Awarded VEIV EngD

Diffusion MRI provides an insight into the microstructural architecture of tissue by observing the restricted and hindered displacement of water molecules undergoing Brownian motion. Diffusion-Tensor MRI (DT-MRI) is the most common diffusion MRI technique and is often used for mapping fibre orientations.

Primary Supervisor: Daniel Alexander 

Industry Sponsor: Philips Medical Systems

Medical: Diffusion MRI

Awarded VEIV EngD

My area of research is human body modelling. I am currently working on methods and techniques that will enable the dynamic animation of static human body scans for both fashion and entertainment purposes through the use of dynamic statistical human body models.

Primary Supervisor: Bernard Buxton

Industry Sponsor: London College of Fashion - BBC Research & Development

Human Body Modelling

Awarded VEIV EngD

This project is concerned with high precision machine-vision inspection systems for detecting foreign or defective bodies/objects on factory conveyor belts. Such systems are sensitive to various external factors such as lighting, dust build ups on the camera lens or slight changes in the colour of the inspected objects, etc.

Primary Supervisor: Daniel Alexander

Industry Sponsor: Sortex

Computer vision

Awarded VEIV EngD

Experimentalists in the biological sciences often query biological databases over the web for a molecule's information. In contrast, computational biologists use the whole of biological datasets for datamining and test statistical associations within specific biological paradigms. In this context, computational biologists use heterogeneous legacy software. Little efforts have been made to approach this problem domain from a requirements engineering point of view.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Finkelstein

Industry Sponsor: NIMR – National Institute for Medical Research

Biological database versioning

Awarded VEIV MSc

My current sponsor is Electronic Arts, and I am based in their Chertesey Development studio. The company is involved in all stages of computer game production, sales and marketing, and I am closely integrated into the development’s "core technology" group. We are currently working on the new "Harry Potter: Goblet Of Fire" game, which is due to be released in winter ’05.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: Electronic Arts

Intelligent camera control

Awarded VEIV MSc

Tom's doctorate research concerns the development of interactive and visual tools to simulate, predict and illustrate the movements of people in a building, aimed at the design phase of building projects.

Primary Supervisor: Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: YRM Limited. Architects, planners, designers

Simulation of pedestrian movements

Awarded VEIV EngD

My work is concerned with the understanding (and subsequent computational modelling) of how neural systems use available visual data to learn about, and behave towards, their environment in a successful way.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: BT Exact - Media Interfaces Lab

Computation of visual ecologies

Awarded VEIV EngD

Over the recent years a number of branches of study have begun to investigate the semiotic structure of desktop computer games and by extension virtual environments. One aspect which has been missing from these studies [primarily of narration by games] is the role that space plays in the production of meaning and engagement.

Primary Supervisor: Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: Ovinity Ltd. Information Visualisation Company

Role of space in computer games

Awarded VEIV EngD

The raison d'etre of this research is to elucidate the fundamental principles that describe the functional structure and behaviour of complex biological systems in terms of their ecological histories.Thought experiments involving complex phenomena like emergence and the creative potential of evolving system are too difficult to analyse from the armchair, but we are now able to study them with computer simulations.

Primary Supervisor: Beau Lotto

Industry Sponsor: Institute of Ophthalmology

Virtual agents

Awarded VEIV EngD

Using Artificial life simulations to understand the evolution of modulairty in the context of hierarchical environments.

Primary Supervisor: Beau Lotto

Industry Sponsor: Institute of Ophthalmology

Computer vision

Awarded VEIV EngD

My research area concerns the development of more realistic methods of character animation using layered models. Current investigations are being made into the possibility of a 5 layer model suitable for both straightforward editing by artists and then conversion into a realtime responsive 3D model for use in a game or animation.

Primary Supervisor: Anthony Steed

Industry Sponsor: Electronic Arts

Character Animation and Kinematics

Awarded VEIV EngD

Although there are many approaches to modelling various aspects of the urban microclimate, ranging in complexity from simple empirical correlations to full-scale CFD models, there are a lack of software tools designed specifically for integrated analysis of the urban microclimate, and in particular for analysing how new developments in an urban area might influence the local climate. This is a niche that this project aims to fill. The aim is to develop a tool that can be used to inform the design process of new developments in some urban area.

Primary Supervisor: Tadj Oreszczyn

Industry Sponsor: BDSP Partnership Ltd

Urban simulation model, about sustainability

Awarded VEIV MRes

The Aim of my Eng-D is the research and development of FILM SET METROLOGY that is a set of methodologys and technologies to allow film and TV beast Computer Digital Special Affects (CGFX) to be used by a wider range of directors and productions.

Primary Supervisor: Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: Framestore CFC 

Film set metrology

Awarded VEIV EngD

The design of architecture is the design of a highly complex, organised system. This research investigates the automation of various aspects of this process with the aid of machine learning and optimisation algorithms.

Primary Supervisor: Prof Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: Foster and Partners 

Adaptive architecture

Awarded VEIV EngD

This work deals with a robot where no domain knowledge is given at all. The genetic algorithms used to control these robots are deeply embodied within their environment. This embodiment means that a very simple genetic algorithm is able to control smart materials like shape memory alloys without any previous domain knowledge about them. The control and exploitation of smart materials is also extended to stereolithographic models. 

Primary Supervisor: Peter Bentley

Industry Sponsor: BAE Systems - Aerospace and Defence

Adaptive robotics

Awarded VEIV EngD

In the field of post-stroke rehabilitation, there appears to be growing interest in the use of virtual reality (VR)-based systems as adjunct technologies to standard therapeutic practices. The limitations and the potentials of this technology are not, however, generally well understood. 

Primary Supervisor: Prof Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: NHS

System Interactions

My doctoral research is the development of integrated software and methodologies that tighten the design optimisation loop. The research has three main foci. Firstly, the development and integration of advanced parametric modelling tools.

Proimary Supervisor: Prof Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: Foster and Partners

Architectural design optimisation

Awarded VEIV EngD

This research aims to develop a rapid, efficient means of producing and interacting with the information required for strategic design at the earliest stages of projects, enabling Whole Life Cost issues to be investigated, conveyed to and understood by all relevant parties.

Primary Supervisor: Alan Penn

Industry Sponsor: Alan Penn

Architectural design process optimisation

Awarded VEIV EngD

The title of my doctorate is "Cloth Modelling and Visualisation". The research involves the design and evaluation of virtual clothing. We regard virtual clothing as computer models to simulate a photo-realistic appearance of real apparel. The aim is to develop technology to seamlessly and automatically implant images of virtual clothing into photographs of real environments. For the simulation of cloth drape behaviour, so called mass-spring particle systems are harnessed.

Primary Supervisor: Bernard Buxton

Industry Sponsor: Body Metrics

Cloth Modelling and Visualisation

Awarded VEIV EngD

Point Distribution Models (PDM’s) of the human body, created from a set of body surface scans (point clouds) can be used to represent variations in 3D body shape through a small number of shape parameters called “Modes of Variation”. However, in order to create accurated PDM’s, the scans must be represented by an equal number of anatomically corresponding points, which are difficult to determine.

Primary Supervisor: Bernard Buxton

Industry Sponsor: Body Metrics

Point Distribution Models of the Human Body

Awarded VEIV EngD

My research looks at occluded facial expressions. I am investigating how missing or occluded data can be accommodated by other sources of information and statistical techniques.

Primary Supervisor: Prof Mel Slater

Industry Sponsor: British Telecommunications, Media Interfaces Lab, part of the Broadband Applications Research Centre

Facial expressions