Seminar: Sweat and Survive - the VR Edition

Goal of the Seminar

In this practical seminar, small groups of students (3) will develop a Virtual Reality (VR) fitness application with a twist. Users will be immersed in a virtual environment that guides them through a fitness exercise while motivating them through (virtually) dangerous situations. Each group will be assigned a different exercise to which the virtual environment and feedback should be adapted. In each scenario the threat level should be adaptable from no danger over medium danger to high danger. Finally, each prototype will be evaluated in a small user study.

Registration for the seminar is done via https://seminars.cs.uni-saarland.de/

Learning Goals:

  • How to:
    • conduct a scientific literature review, and based on that,
    • design a conceptualization of an interactive software prototype to finally
    • document the concept in a written report
  • Basics of creating interactive VR applications that use (full) body tracking
  • Basics of designing, implementing, conducting, and analyzing a user study

 

Process

Phase 1 - Basics

You will learn about:

  • The goals and details of the seminar 
  • How to perform a literature review and why
  • How to document the concept of your interactive system in a written report
  • Some related (scientific) VR projects to get inspired

Your group's tasks will be:

  • Form groups of 3
  • Voting for your top three sport exercises (each group should have a different exercise)
  • Think of a concept and base it on a literature research
  • Document your concept in a written report (see below)

Phase 2 - Hands-On

You will learn about:

  • Unity 3D, how to create VR applications, and how to interface VR tracking hardware

Your group's tasks will be:

  • Developing a prototype that implements the concept of Phase 1 
  • Prepare and give a presentation about your concept and current development state (mid-term presentation)

Phase 3 - Evaluation and Documentation

You will learn about:

  • How to design, conduct, evaluate, and report a user study
  • How to write up a project report

Your group's tasks will be:

  • Preparing your prototype for a user study
  • Conducting the user study & analyze the results
  • Participating in the studies of the other groups
  • Prepare and give a presentation about your final system and the user study and its results 
  • Write up a final report detailing your project and study

 

Reports

Two written reports have to be submitted in this seminar - the concept report and the final report.
Below you can find the formal requirements for these two reports and examples of how they could be structured.

While the formal requirements (template, overall length, number of cited papers) must be adhered to, you are free to deviate from the proposed structure if that makes more sense to present your project. If you deviate, however, ensure that the topics proposed in the example structures are adequately discussed in your document.

Concept Report

The written concept report should be 2-3 pages long (excluding references) and submitted as a PDF in ACM SIG format (2-column). The following LaTeX template should be forked into your own group:

https://umtl-git.dfki.de/seminar-sweat-and-survive/templates/concept-document

A concept report could be organized like this:

  1. Motivation of the General Topic

    • Why is the topic of the seminar important?
    • What problem is being addressed?

  2. Related Work

  3. Concept

    • Description of the chosen sports exercise (e.g., planking, squatting, hanging on a hangbar, ...).
    • Explanation of the adrenaline-inducing threat scenario tailored to the exercise (e.g., being chased by virtual creatures, navigating through hazardous environments).
    • How the threat scenario enhances the exercise experience and induces adrenaline.
    • How will people use the system?

  4. Implementation Approach

    • What would an implementation of your idea include?
    • Technical details of the implementation, including software and hardware used.
    • Steps taken to integrate the sports exercise with the threat scenario.

  5. Challenges

    • What aspects need to be considered to ensure the system works and provides a good user experience?
    • Potential technical and user experience challenges.
    • Solutions and adaptations planned to overcome these challenges.

  6. Evaluation Idea

    • How could you demonstrate that the system actually solves the problem?
    • Methodology of the user study conducted with the prototype.
    • Description of the planned procedures.
    • What data do you plan to collect and how.
    • What are your hypotheses (i.e., what do you expect to see in the data)?

  7. Conclusion

    • Brief summary of the idea.
    • Reflection on the planned overall experience and the impact of the VR application.
    • Suggestions for future work and improvements.

  8. References

    • List of all cited scientific papers and other relevant sources.

 

Final Report

The written final report should be 3-5 pages long (excluding references) and submitted as a PDF in ACM SIG format (2-column). The following LaTeX template should be forked into your own group:
https://umtl-git.dfki.de/seminar-sweat-and-survive/templates/final-report

A final report could be organized like this:

  1. Introduction

    • Brief overview of the project and its objectives.
    • Summary of the initial concept and motivation.

  2. Related Work

    • Review of relevant literature and previous work in VR sports applications and virtual threat scenarios.
    • Citation of at least 5 scientific papers related to the topic.

  3. Concept and Implementation

    • Detailed description of the proposed VR application.
    • Explanation of how the application allows users to perform sports exercises while experiencing high adrenaline in virtual threat scenarios.
    • Technical details of the implementation, including software and hardware used.

  4. User Study

    • Methodology of the user study conducted with the prototype.
    • Description of the participants and the procedures followed.
    • Data collection methods and tools used.

  5. Results and Discussion

    • Presentation of the findings from the user study.
    • Analysis of the data collected, including user feedback and performance metrics.
    • Comparison with other groups' user studies and their virtual scenarios and sports exercises.

  6. Challenges and Solutions

    • Discussion of the challenges faced during the implementation and user study.
    • Solutions and adaptations made to overcome these challenges.

  7. Conclusion

    • Summary of the key findings and insights gained from the project.
    • Reflection on the overall experience and the impact of the VR application.
    • Suggestions for future work and improvements.

  8. References

    • List of all cited scientific papers and other relevant sources.

 

Grading

  • The seminar encompasses multiple deliverables (see time table below for the deadlines). All deliverables must be submitted by their respective deadlines. Failing to submit a deliverable results in failing the seminar.
  • The following deliverables and presentations are graded according to the following aspects:

    • Final Concept Document (10%):
      • Clarity of Writing
      • Completeness
      • Adherence to Word Count
      • Originality of Idea
      • Reflection of Related Work

    • Mid-Term Presentation (10%):
      • Clarity and Organization
      • Content Quality
      • Visual Aids
      • Engagement and Delivery
      • Q&A Handling

    • Final Presentation (20%):
      • Clarity and Organization
      • Content Quality
      • Visual Aids
      • Engagement and Delivery
      • Q&A Handling
      • Live-Demo

    • Final Report (20%):
      • Clarity of Writing
      • Completeness
      • Visual Aids

    • Final Prototype (40%):
      • Usability
      • Stability
      • Design
      • Documentation
        • Clarity and Readability
        • Technical Accuracy
        • Visual Presentation

 

Schedule

Date Room Topic Slides
15.04.2025 - 10:15 - 12:00 DFKI, VisRoom Kickoff & Concept Basics Kickoff Slides as PDF

27.04.2025 - Deadline (end of day)

   Deliverable: Draft of Concept  
29.04.2025 - 10:15 - 12:00 DFKI, VisRoom Unity Basics + Hardware Introduction  
05.05.2025 - Deadline (end of day)   Deadline for LSF Registration  
07.05.2025 - Deadline (end of day)   Deliverable: Final Concept Document  
27.05.2025 - 10:15 - 12:00 DFKI, VisRoom

How To: User Study & Final Report

  
03.06.2025 - 10:15 - 12:00 DFKI, Turing 1 Mid-Term Presentations  
01.07.2025 until 11.07.2025 DFKI, BanaLab User Study Time  
15.07.2025 - 10:15 - 12:00 DFKI, VisRoom Final Presentations inkl. Live-Demo  
20.07.2025 - Deadline (end of day)   Deliverable: Final Report & Documented Prototype  

 

Requirements

Since this is a practical seminar, every student should meet the following minimum requirements:

  • strong programming background
  • experience with Unity, C#, and/or VR technology is a plus (but not strictly required)

 

Progress Control

To ensure a fair and even distribution of the work within the project groups, we require the following measures:

  • All code has to be committed at the provided GitLab
    • Everybody commits their own work
    • When pair programming, note this in the commit message, e.g. "Implemented Feature X - André + Felix"
    • When experimenting and trying out things (that eventually might not be part of the final prototype), still commit such work in Git on a separate branch
  • Sources of all written documents have to be committed at the provided GitLab (e.g. LaTex or Markdown)
    • Everybody commits their own work
    • When pair-writing, note this in the commit message, e.g. "Updated Introduction - André + Felix"

 

Attendance

In-person attendance is compulsory in this seminar. If attendance is not fulfilled, no certificate can be issued for the course. Exceptions are only possible with a doctor's certificate or if there is a conflict with an examination of another course. Lectures, exercise groups or tutorials of other courses are excluded from this and cannot be used as a reason for absence.

 

Organisation

Felix Kosmalla (felix.kosmalla@dfki.de)
Dr. André Zenner (andre.zenner@dfki.de)
Prof. Dr. Antonio Krüger