vrijdag, januari 11, 2008
We want your face
I spent (wasted?) all day figuring out how to make people select and upload an avatar or profile picture to their account on the site. But here it is, from today onwards you will find a link in the edit profile page to upload an avatar. That should give a face to the people solving and creating questions and quizzes.Asp.net (the programming language I use) only offers some file upload control, but I wanted something were users could crop the image their uploaded so the resulting avatar would always be 50 by 50 pixels. There is a great and expensive control available that does that (I-Load from Radactive) but I'm not going to spend 250$ on my free site. So I found a control named WebImageMaker. It was made by Tom Crane and does exactly what I wanted: upload an image, and select a part of it. I changed the control just a little bit so I could translate error messages and buttons in multiple languages.
The upload limit is 4 MB, and that is a default in asp.net. I did not see any reason to change that. Maybe one of these weeks you'll be able to upload images with questions, as I've figured out the basics.
Labels: about2findout.com, asp.net, avatars, new
maandag, juni 11, 2007
There will be a 3D internet
My company believes that one of the 5 innovations with the most impact for the next 5 years will be the emergence of a 3D Internet.
I've posted enough on Second Life, and Second Life and education. Today I just want to mention 2 other 3D Internet places:
- Club Penguin : this is a 3D environment created for kids. That is not a bad idea if you realise Second Life is a lot about sex & money, as are many Internet places or even real life.
- Active Worlds : there are actually two similar environments just to add to the confusion: there is http://www.active-worlds.com/ and http://www.activeworlds.com. Both are different from the omnipresent Second Life in that they don't offer one virtual world with many islands, but actually a set of worlds you can choose from. The one with the dash (active-world.com) is available in a few languages and looks like a 3D chat. The one without the dash (activeworld.com) is English only and has an interesting section for eduction. For example University of Colorado's Virtual Computer.
I've posted enough on Second Life, and Second Life and education. Today I just want to mention 2 other 3D Internet places:
- Club Penguin : this is a 3D environment created for kids. That is not a bad idea if you realise Second Life is a lot about sex & money, as are many Internet places or even real life.
- Active Worlds : there are actually two similar environments just to add to the confusion: there is http://www.active-worlds.com/ and http://www.activeworlds.com. Both are different from the omnipresent Second Life in that they don't offer one virtual world with many islands, but actually a set of worlds you can choose from. The one with the dash (active-world.com) is available in a few languages and looks like a 3D chat. The one without the dash (activeworld.com) is English only and has an interesting section for eduction. For example University of Colorado's Virtual Computer.
Labels: 3D internet, avatars, Second Life
dinsdag, mei 22, 2007
Meez: a 3D avatar for your profile
Identity is a big thing on the internet, and without online identities, the whole social software concept stops. Most sites allow you to upload a profile picture or 'avatar'.
On Meez.com you can create your own profile pic as a 3D animated avatar. It is very simple: you create a free account and make your 'meez' by choosing a gender, haircut, top clothing, pants, shoes, attribute and background. Each time you have the choice between free or paying objects. After that, export the picture as a link, a picture in your blog or forum, or export it to your phone.
I had to try and I could not resist: my 'attribute' is not a microphone or a flower, it is Brad Pitt :-).
On Meez.com you can create your own profile pic as a 3D animated avatar. It is very simple: you create a free account and make your 'meez' by choosing a gender, haircut, top clothing, pants, shoes, attribute and background. Each time you have the choice between free or paying objects. After that, export the picture as a link, a picture in your blog or forum, or export it to your phone.
I had to try and I could not resist: my 'attribute' is not a microphone or a flower, it is Brad Pitt :-).
vrijdag, mei 04, 2007
Avatars again: Let's meet at the restaurant's web site - Weblin and Itzle
I have been discussing full fledged 3D web virtual worlds such as Second Life. I have also been discussing cheap ways to add talking avatars to your web site. And now for something in between: avatars that move around in the current 2D web world.
Some say the web will evolve into Second Life-like experiences with 3D interfaces because that gives a richer and much more natural interaction. Today, there are free services out there that allow you to virtually 'walk' existing web pages, and interact with other visitors via their avatars. So you will actually be able to say 'let's meet at the restaurant's web site'. What a brave new world :-).
The first example is Itzle.com. It only works on Firefox and you get a command bar at the bottom of your screen where you can enter chat, or move to other sites. The avatars are very, very basic graphically, but they will gesture, talk via text balloons and walk to any point on the screen you click on. So you can actually go to some part of the page and comment on it or explain it.
The second example is weblin.com. The weblin program installs plugins for both Firefox and Internet Explorer. Make sure to select a 3D avatar because they are the ones that can gesture (like wave, sit down, etc.) You can either chat with the other weblin visitors to that page via a chat box or balloon text boxes. The avatars look much better, but they can only walk around at the bottom of a maximised browser window.
So what's the use of all this? Well, it's a more natural way of chatting than via a text box anyway. And I also see some use for education.
For example, you could meet with people on a web form and explain them how to fill it in. You can go with your students to a wikipedia page, literally 'walk around' on it and explore together and have a discussion on the topic.
For example, you can record screen caps or screen video from your avatar explaining a web-based application and integrate it in an e-learning course. Instead of an overlay with 'Fill your name in here and press next to continu', the avatar/coach can point to the text box and say 'You need to type your name here before you can go on.' It even gets more interesting when these avatar/agents can be scripted.
(Thanks go to Ralph for pointing me to the two sites.)
Some say the web will evolve into Second Life-like experiences with 3D interfaces because that gives a richer and much more natural interaction. Today, there are free services out there that allow you to virtually 'walk' existing web pages, and interact with other visitors via their avatars. So you will actually be able to say 'let's meet at the restaurant's web site'. What a brave new world :-).
The first example is Itzle.com. It only works on Firefox and you get a command bar at the bottom of your screen where you can enter chat, or move to other sites. The avatars are very, very basic graphically, but they will gesture, talk via text balloons and walk to any point on the screen you click on. So you can actually go to some part of the page and comment on it or explain it.The second example is weblin.com. The weblin program installs plugins for both Firefox and Internet Explorer. Make sure to select a 3D avatar because they are the ones that can gesture (like wave, sit down, etc.) You can either chat with the other weblin visitors to that page via a chat box or balloon text boxes. The avatars look much better, but they can only walk around at the bottom of a maximised browser window.
So what's the use of all this? Well, it's a more natural way of chatting than via a text box anyway. And I also see some use for education.For example, you could meet with people on a web form and explain them how to fill it in. You can go with your students to a wikipedia page, literally 'walk around' on it and explore together and have a discussion on the topic.
For example, you can record screen caps or screen video from your avatar explaining a web-based application and integrate it in an e-learning course. Instead of an overlay with 'Fill your name in here and press next to continu', the avatar/coach can point to the text box and say 'You need to type your name here before you can go on.' It even gets more interesting when these avatar/agents can be scripted.
(Thanks go to Ralph for pointing me to the two sites.)
Labels: avatars, Itzle, Weblin
donderdag, april 26, 2007
Avatars on the cheap: logitech video effects
One cannot discuss colors and taste, but I do believe I have an extrodinary good looking webcam. It's a Logitech Quickcam Sphere MP.
This and some other selected camera's come with video effects. In short, you can download avatars from the logitech site, and virtual 'ornaments'. As the camera can recognise your face you can record yourself as a speaking avatar.
The result is somewhat more amateuristic than the sculptoris solution but can also increase the fun factor of a course or learning game at low cost. I've tried with three different avatars: dollar bill, a parrot and a scrambled view of myself (futuristic effect). In all movies the avatar asks a question from an IQ test. Enjoy.
The parrot sketch
Dollar Bill
Future Bert
Labels: avatars, logitech, webcam
zaterdag, april 21, 2007
Avatars on the cheap: sculptoris
If used sensibly, avatars have the potential to enhance the user interaction with your web site and the retention and fun factor of your e-learning modules.
Today I want to discuss one cheap way to include high quality talking avatars. I've been playing around with the Sculptoris Voice Lite program. On their site (www.sculptoris.com) you are greeted by one of the characters, and you can download a 30 day trial version. After that the license is only 99$ and you don't need to pay any redistribution rights of your character files that are exported as Flash 5 files. Flash has about 99% coverage if I believe Adobe, so it will play everywhere.
The program could not be more easy to use:
1- Choose the sound file (.wav) that contains the voice. It can be your own recording or a Text-To-Speech voice.
2- Optionally select the text file (.txt) that contains the text spoken in step 1. If you provide the file, the lip synchronisation will be more accurate.
3- Select the character to use. There are several build-in characters, male or female or even animal. If you purchase the additional Voice Character Creation Development Kit, you can make your own avatars or derive them from the free source files of the default ones.
4- Select the output flash file location and name.
5- Press 'Build Character'. Done. You will find the flash (.swf) and html preview file in the folder you selected. To include in your site, just copy/paste the HTML code and upload the flash file.
I've made two examples, one with Text-To-Speech synthetic voice, and one with my own voice.
First example can be viewed here.
The avatar (I named him Otto) asks one of the questions that I received from Lut for my birthday after my call in this blog post. The question is in English.
The Text-To-Speech voice was made with TextAloud, as described in this previous post.
The second example can be viewed here.
It is my own voice and gives you another question donated by my neighbour and brother-in-law Hans, this time in Dutch.
The recording is very basic and noisy because it is made with the default Sound Recorder tool found in Windows. There is probably much better available, but I'm not an expert on sound engineering and background noise reduction.
I think Sculptoris is a good and relatively cheap way to add some fun and interaction to your site or e-learning, and I'm considering moderate use of the flash avatars on about2findout.com.
Today I want to discuss one cheap way to include high quality talking avatars. I've been playing around with the Sculptoris Voice Lite program. On their site (www.sculptoris.com) you are greeted by one of the characters, and you can download a 30 day trial version. After that the license is only 99$ and you don't need to pay any redistribution rights of your character files that are exported as Flash 5 files. Flash has about 99% coverage if I believe Adobe, so it will play everywhere.
The program could not be more easy to use:1- Choose the sound file (.wav) that contains the voice. It can be your own recording or a Text-To-Speech voice.
2- Optionally select the text file (.txt) that contains the text spoken in step 1. If you provide the file, the lip synchronisation will be more accurate.
3- Select the character to use. There are several build-in characters, male or female or even animal. If you purchase the additional Voice Character Creation Development Kit, you can make your own avatars or derive them from the free source files of the default ones.
4- Select the output flash file location and name.
5- Press 'Build Character'. Done. You will find the flash (.swf) and html preview file in the folder you selected. To include in your site, just copy/paste the HTML code and upload the flash file.
I've made two examples, one with Text-To-Speech synthetic voice, and one with my own voice.
First example can be viewed here.The avatar (I named him Otto) asks one of the questions that I received from Lut for my birthday after my call in this blog post. The question is in English.
The Text-To-Speech voice was made with TextAloud, as described in this previous post.
The second example can be viewed here.
It is my own voice and gives you another question donated by my neighbour and brother-in-law Hans, this time in Dutch.
The recording is very basic and noisy because it is made with the default Sound Recorder tool found in Windows. There is probably much better available, but I'm not an expert on sound engineering and background noise reduction.
I think Sculptoris is a good and relatively cheap way to add some fun and interaction to your site or e-learning, and I'm considering moderate use of the flash avatars on about2findout.com.
Labels: avatars, sculptoris, Text-To-Speech, TTS
