Hewlett Packard (HP) and the University of Birmingham have entered a partnership to establish the HP Visual and Spatial Technology (VISTA) Centre. The collaboration established a technological centre of excellence in which HP technology can be showcased within a strategic academic environment; current facilities include a 4.2m by 1.8m dual channel Fakespace PowerWall and the first HP SV7 Scalable Visualisation System to be installed in Europe. The Centre will be used as a focus for research by appropriate research groups and will serve as a focus for customer-oriented activities and development partners. A major part of the funding for this is from the West Midlands regional development agency to set up the West Midlands Imaging and Visualisation Network for outreach to local small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and to make them aware of, and support their use of, a wide range of imaging and visualisation techniques.

This workshop will be jointly organised by the User Group, Advanced Visual Systems (AVS) (a major partner in the HP Centre) and the HP Centre. It will based on an introduction to Visualisation and AVS, mainly aiming to stimulate interest amongst SMEs, other commercial firms and academic researchers who are not aware of the possibilities that this technology opens up for them. The provisional program is:

 

10.00		Arrival and coffee
10.30-11.00		Introduction to West Midlands Visualisation and Imaging Network, the HP VISTA Centre and the AVS User Group
11.00-11.30		Data Capture techniques
11.30-11.45		Break
11.45-12.30		Overview of various visualisation techniques
12.30-13.00		From data capture to visualisation - a worked example
13.00-14.00		Lunch
14.00-16.00		Demonstrations and hands-on. AVS personnel will be available to dicuss any actual or potential visualisation requirements with delegates.
16.00		Close

The workshop is sponsored by Inition stereoscopic 3D and virtual reality specialists who will be displaying the new SeeReal display and Sharp's new 3D notebook, the AVS User Group, the West Midlands Visualisation and Imaging Network and AVS.

Please email Paul Hatton, Technical Director of the Centre at P.S.Hatton@bham.ac.uk or contact him on 0121-414-3994 to register an interest or request further details.