Building an Interactive, Three-dimensional Virtual World

The movement of graphics and audio programming towards three dimensions is to better simulate the way we experience our world. In this project I looked to use methods for coming closer to such simulation via realistic graphics and sound combined with a natural interface. I did most of my work on a Dell OptiPlex with an 800 MHz Pentium III processor and an NVIDlA GeForce 256 AGP Plus graphics accelerator -high end products in the consumer market as of April 2000. For graphics, I used OpenGL [1], an open·source, multi-platform set of graphics libraries that is relatively easy to use, coded in C . The basic engine I first put together was a system to place objects in a scene and to navigate around the scene in real time. Once I accomplished this, I was able to investigate specific techniques for making parts of a scene more appealing.

Estimating the Impact of Catastrophic Sea Level Rise in Maine

Maine's 3,500 miles of coastline is the longest coastline in the continental US. The goal of our study was to use GIS to estimate the impact future global sea level rise could potentially have on our state. We show the area of coastline and some of the economic and social impacts that would result from a rise of one meter and six meters. We used roads to estimate the impact on infrastructure and public building, including schools, libraries, hospitals, police and fire stations, as a measure of social impact. A sea level rise of six meters would result in a loss of over 650 km¬2 from coastal communities and cost the state of Maine over 3 million in repaving costs. Through our study, we hope coastal communities will be able to prepare for and react to the predicted changes in global sea level.