Virtual Prototyping: Evaluating the Digital Twin Based Virtual Factory for New Product Introduction

Shortening lifecycles and increasing complexity make product and production lifecycle processes more challenging than ever for manufacturing enterprises. Virtual Prototyping (VP) technologies promise a viable solution to handle such challenges in reducing time and physical builds as well as increasing quality. In previous studies, the Digital Twin (DT) based Virtual Factory (VF) concept showed significant potential to handle co-evolution by integrating 3D factory and product models with immersive and interactive 3D Virtual Reality (VR) simulation technology as well as real-time bidirectional data synchronisation between virtual and physical production systems. In this article, we present an extension to the paper “Demonstrating and Evaluating the Digital Twin Based Virtual Factory for Virtual Prototyping” presented at CARV2021. The study presents an evaluation by industry experts of the DT based VF concept for VP in the context of New Product Introduction (NPI) processes. The concept is demonstrated in two cases: wind turbine blade manufacturing and nacelle assembly operations at Vestas Wind Systems A/S. The study shows that the VF provides an immersive virtual environment, which allows the users to reduce the time needed for prototyping. The industry experts propose several business cases for the introduced solution and find that the phases that would have the most gain are the later ones (production) where the product design is more mature.

How do users interact with Virtual Geographic Environments? Users’ behavior evaluation in urban participatory planning

For the past twenty years, the adoption of Virtual Geographic Environments is thriving. This democratization is due to numerous new opportunities offered by this medium. However, in participatory urban planning these interactive 3D geovisualizations are still labeled as very advanced means, and are only scarcely used. The involvement of citizens in urban decision-making is indeed carefully planned ahead to limit off-topic feedback. A better comprehension of Virtual Geographic Environments, and more specifically of users’ strategic behaviors while interacting with this medium could enhance participants’ contributions. The users’ strategic behavior was assessed in this article through an experimental study. A total of 107 participants completed online tasks about the identification of 3D scenes’ footprints, the comparison of buildings’ heights, and the visibility of objects through the scenes. The interactions of the participants were recorded (i.e. pressed keys, pointing device interactions), as well as the camera positions adopted to complete specific tasks. The results show that: (1) users get more efficient throughout the study; (2) interruptions in 3D manipulation appear to highlight difficulties in interacting with the virtual environments; (3) users tend to centralize their positions within the scene, notably around their starting position; (4) the type of task strongly affects the behavior of users, limiting or broadening their explorations. The results of this experimental study are a valuable resource that can be used to improve the design of future urban planning projects involving Virtual Geographic Environments, e.g. with the creation of personalized 3D tools.

The Innovation of Augmented Reality Learning Media with Interactive Component Model to Improve Special Ability of Vocational Education Knowledge in the Digital Era

<span lang="IN">This learning media innovation research aims to: (1) develop learning innovations of augmented reality learning media interactive tractor machine with 3D model; (2) test the feasibility level of the most recent advances learning media innovation; and (3) test the effectiveness of the most recent advances learning media innovations. The researcher selected to utilize the research and development (R&amp;D) method for this research, and then used a quasi-experimental research method to examine the effectiveness of the development of learning media innovation. Two teams of professionals, e-learning media professionals and vocational education material professionals, work together to validate products. The study's results include the following: First, two teams of validators determined that the augmented reality</span><span lang="EN-US"> learning media with interactive 3D produced had a high attraction. Second, in the digital 4.0 era, augmented reality learning media with interactive 3D produced can help vocational students strengthen their specific abilities</span><span lang="IN">.</span>

An Adaptive and Interactive 3D Simulation Platform for Physics Education using Machine Learning and Game Engine

When undergraduate students just got into the physics field, it might be difficult for them to understand, think, and imagine what is happening in certain phenomenons [6]. For example, when two objects have different masses and velocity collide into each other, how are they going to act? Are they going to stop, bounce away from each other, or stick together? This simulation helps the students who do not feel comfortable imagining these scenarios. Currently we only have the gravitation lab, the trajectory lab, and the collision lab. The gravitation lab is a planet orbiting a sun, where the users can input different masses for the sun and planet, and the radius (in AU), the program will then calculate the gravitational force and orbital period while the planet starts orbiting its sun at a certain speed [7]. The trajectory lab is an object doing projectile motion, where the user input variables like initial velocity, angle, height, and acceleration, the program will present current position and velocity on the screen as the object doing projectile motion [8]. The collision lab is where the user input the masses and velocities for the two objects, and after the user decide the collision is going to elastic or not, set the lab and press start, the program will calculate the total momentum and kinetic energy and have it on the right side of the screen while the objects starts colliding [9].

Interactive 3D visualization and post-processing analysis of vertex-based unstructured polyhedral meshes with ParaView

The development of physics-based 3D models that investigate the behavior of biological tissues requires effective and efficient visualization tools. The open-source software ParaView has such capabilities, but often impose a steep learning curve due to the use of the Visualization Toolkit (VTK) data structures. To overcome this, I show how to setup the components of 3D vertex-like models, i.e., vertices, faces, and polyhedra, into the VTK data format and then output as ParaView unstructured grid files. I present a few relevant tools to visualize and analyze the files in ParaView. All sample codes are available in the Github repository vis3Dvertex.

USER EVALUATION OF INTERACTIVE THEMATIC 3D CITY MODELS – APPLICATION OF ASYNCHRONOUS REMOTE TESTING METHOD

Asynchronous remote usability testing is a method based on a software platform used to automatically record test participants' activities when they interact with a given product in their natural environment, for example, at home. This method has been frequently used in previous decades in web design and mobile application development but has rarely been utilised in geovisualization. The importance of remote usability testing has rapidly increased in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The 3DmoveR (3D Movement and Interaction Recorder) application was used for asynchronous remote testing presented in this paper. 3DmoveR is a research tool designed for user testing of interactive 3D visualizations in web browsers using open technologies such as PHP, JavaScript, and the Three.js library. This study focuses on an evaluation of interactive 3D city models presenting thematic information expressed by colour scale. An experiment was designed as a within-subject study consisting of two simple questionnaires, a training task and six experimental trials. Finding a building of a given category (depicted as building colour) within an interactive 3D city model was used as the experimental task. Speed and accuracy of user performances were recorded, as well as user strategy, subjective evaluations, and possible intervening variables. The results were recorded from 110 participants, where 76 of them were correct and analysed further. It can be concluded that the tested colour scale (based on the Energy Performance Certificate) was not entirely appropriate. We further analysed and discussed intervening variables that may affect remote usability testing of 3D visualizations.