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ABOUT US

"DAE-Research offers an attractive information service for organizations facing challenges, for which game technology might offer a solution"

DAE-Research is the research cell of the bachelor study program Digital Arts and Entertainment of Howest Kortrijk, where both demand-driven applied research projects and applied research projects on its own initiative are set up.

The research projects are oriented on exploring new game, VFX, animation & film technology (hard- and software) and transferring that knowledge to the bachelor program as well as companies in different sectors. Besides entertainment purposes, technology can be used in multiple ways to stimulate innovation tracks in companies, social-profit organizations as well as a partner in research consortia.

What is applied research? Scientific findings from university and other research labs, combined with experts’ experiences in the respective professional field and expectations of the envisioned end users, are creatively translated into innovative solutions and prototypes. This offers a surplus value for achieving the goals within the industry and/or social impact.

In addition to projects on demand, DAE-Research also conducts exploratory research on its own initiative. Hereby, the potential surplus value of new technology, whether this is hardware or software, is mapped out to work out innovative solutions for the various sectors.

Recent research topics are linked to our 6 majors within the DAE bachelor program: game development, game graphics production, independent game production, interactive sound production, VFX and 3D animation.

Research topics include immersive technology (VR/AR) and metaverse, spatial computing, applied games, artificial intelligence, conversational AI, motion capture, immersive sound, pose estimation and body tracking, procedural 3D content and automation (Houdini, photogrammetry, …)

Do contact us for more information on project ideas.

OUR LATEST REEL

HIGHLIGHTED USE CASES

Experiment: Aged-Up Deepfakes
From this TETRA research project AI in production, we have prepared an introductory workshop on deepfakes to give to the DAE students of the VFX major. During the annual creative week, all regular courses for first and second year students are canceled and replaced by creative sessions. Our goal was to provide an introduction to deepfakes from the research group: what is deepfake technology, what can you do with standard software without heavy programming yourself, what are the points of interest if you want to get started with it, … Due to the lockdown, the creation week was canceled this academic year, but the preparations for the workshop were already ready. The workshop with students will be moved to a later date in one of the VFX classes, but we are happy to share the approach of the workshop with the guidance group here. Read about the limits of this technology and how we tackled Star Wars in a hands-on use case with the combination of different tools.
Genetic mutations
As the subject of the test case on which we could test a mutagen tool, we chose a simplified parametrically constructed creature blockout in Houdini. Creature block-outs are a simple geometric representation of a creature that can be worked out at a later stage for use in a game or movie, for example. The block-out largely determines the creative view. A mutagen tool can be a very useful way to quickly generate variations of a procedurally constructed model with a minimum of user input while still retaining sufficient control over the results. The method guarantees unique results because the values are randomly generated. In addition, the method is very fast.
Audio in Games
Audio is an essential element to the success of any game. It provides an immersive experience that can make the difference between the player enjoying a game or becoming frustrated and giving up. Delayed, missing or incorrect sound effects can seriously affect the immersion of the game. Additionally, inconsistent, or sudden changes in volume of the background music can break immersion. With this use case we want to investigate what the impact of AI for audio in games can be, and if problems such as error detection in sound effects and music can be addressed. This may or may not bother players while playing, however, the right sound effects or background music can set the atmosphere while playing a game. Additionally, audio is an important element in determining what is happening in the game at any given moment. This can be illustrated by moments such as enemies sneaking up on you from the side, giving them the advantage to attack. Unfortunately, audio issues still exist in games. They can be caused by several factors, including code changes, assets that are not properly optimized, or simply the way the game is played. We refer to these as bugs. Actively detecting audio bugs requires quite some time. Furthermore, these are sometimes overlooked because game testers give a lower priority to audio. For example, people sometimes test without their headphones or with the volume set to 0, because detecting graphical and functional bugs involves a lot of repetition, which means that sound effects are also played ad nauseum. In this use case, we explore ways to automatically detect audio bugs during development. This can help you identify and resolve them before they cause problems for the players. However, we’ll ignore the more nuanced challenges with audio, as detecting technical things like room temperature are too niche to delve into further.
Azure Kinect body tracking character creator
The visitor stands in front of a screen. Two portraits of lords of the castle are shown on the screen. The visitor can select a lord of the castle by effectively moving his hands and clicking on it virtually. Once chosen, the visitor can dress up a character with items of clothing from the lords of the castle. Each choice is commented via audio. It is in this way that the visitor gets to know the characters better.

CONTACT US

Vicky Vermeulen – Research manager
vicky.vermeulen@howest.be

Jan Pauly – Project manager
jan.pauly@howest.be

Howest Campus The Level
Digital Arts & Entertainment

Botenkoperstraat 2
8500 Kortrijk
Belgium

Howest Campus The Square
Digital Arts & Entertainment Research Lab

Luipaardstraat 12A
8550 Kortrijk
Belgium