Virtual Dissection
Since the advent of Natural Sciences, artists and scientists have been working hand-in-hand to produce images, conferring visual presence to fleeting observations, giving them the means to travel across space and time. Among them, the images born out of dissections are most intriguing, as they emerge from the bodies through the craft of the researcher. As such, the fabrication of scientific images is not only a way to represent and circulate definite knowledge, but a way of imagining and thinking with materials. Advances in computerized three-dimensional visualization allow a new array of possibilities to extend these heuristic practices. Manipulating material datasets using visual and haptic feedback in a virtual working environment will transform the way scientists experience information and share their perspectives.
The experimental setting »Virtual Dissection« is concerned with the potential utility of virtual reality technologies for anatomical and paleontological dissections and preparations. Three-dimensional image data will be transferred into virtual reality and manipulated with novel software tools. We will develop innovative algorithms to assist the researchers in the segmentation of those datasets. Segmentation is a data-processing method in which we identify and delineate boundaries between different materials or tissues and then assign a specific meaning to them – in order to achieve an intelligible representation of what we are looking at. Two aspects will be addressed in »Virtual Dissection«: Firstly, interactive segmentation methods will enable users to simultaneously manipulate the data and discover embedded objects, such as a fragile fossil inside of a hard layer of rock. Secondly, algorithm-assisted segmentation will provide interactive guidance to the researchers. That way, researchers can augment their perception and understanding of the situation depicted in the data, which would greatly help to plan and rehearse sensitive paleontological field excavations or surgical interventions. Moreover, the new virtual reality implementation will incorporate haptics, for example tangible force feedback.
This way of assigning materiality to the dataset will enable digital materials to resist and thus to interact with the body of the researcher. We expect many potential benefits of the transfer of such datasets from 2D screen representations to 4D virtual reality. Researchers will understand complex shapes of anatomical structures using tangible instruments to explore anatomy in a more intuitive way. Moreover, we will investigate the potential of a multi-sensory integration of haptic and visual stimuli during the developmental process of mental representations of complex structures. We believe that multi-user collaborative work will foster the simultaneous formation of shared mental imagery. Systematic analysis of user interaction with this prototype will shed light onto the untapped potentials of virtual reality applications. Extending digitally the activity of cutting – and segmenting – as a hands-on approach to thinking, we strive to bring dissection – a classic analog craftsmanship – into the digital universe of the 21st century.