Education

Research Interests

Research Experience

• Simulation of Fruit Senescence and Decay: This technique simulates interactions between multiple aging and decay processes in fruit. Our biologically derived reaction-diffusion model generates growth patterns for areas of fungal and bacterial infection. This process changes the physical properties of the surface and the internal volume substrate. We provide a tool that allows the simulation to be both physically accurate, and allows artists to customize output.
  
  
• Motion Capture: We are using our Vicon system to capture a motion capture database. This will allow us to simulate virtual character naturally in virtual worlds.
  
  
• GPU Programming: This work utilizes the architecture and capabilities of modern GPUs. The GPU is a massively multi-core processor utilized in research to increase performance of simulations for real-time performance of a variety of path planning algorithms (such as R*GPU), useful for high dimensional planning problems.
  
  
• Virtual Archaeology: gathered experimental archaeological data and investigated and validated how various water levels and glass fixture shapes, likely used during early Islamic times, changed the overall light patterns and downward caustics. We applied results to Mosque of Córdoba to get a more perceptually valid and physically accurate lighting model.
  
  
• Untethered Motion Capture Evaluation for Flightline Maintenance: The purpose of this effort is to explore and evaluate the utility of novel motion capture technologies within the Air Force maintenance domain. Here we used machine learning techniques to build a prototype system to classify and recognize various maintenance activities.
  
  
• AVIS-MS: Advanced Visual and Instruction Systems for Maintenance Support: This project investigates technologies that maybe used in the maintenance of Air Force equipment. Here we used virtual reality and motion capture to help display technical instructions to maintainers.
  
  
• Indirect Motion Capture: Head Tracker: In this project we attempted a first step in an indirect motion capture system. The system measures the head location from motion capture data and tracks the output on screen where the subject is looking in real-time.
  
  
• Virtual Checkpoint: This project implemented real time gesture recognition of a motion capture subject which controlled a virtual character. The virtual environment interacted with the characters gestures in real time. The system was robust for a wide range

Professional Work Experience

Selected Publications    See Full List...

• J. Kider, K. Pollock, A. Safonova, "A Data-driven Appearance Model for Human Fatigue", Symposium for Computer Animation, 2011
• J. Kider,S.Raja,N.Badler, "Fruit Senescence and Decay Simulation", to appear in Computer Graphics Forum (Proceedings of Eurographics 2011)
• J. Kider, M. Henderson, M. Likhachev, and A. Safonova, "High-dimensional Planning on the GPU", IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, 2010
• J. Kider, R. Fletcher, N.Yu, R.Holod, A.Chalmers, N.I.Badler, "Recreating Early Islamic Glass Lamp Lighting", 10th VAST International Symposium on Virtual

Teaching Experience

Awards

• Honorable Metion Paper Award SIGGRAPH/ Eurographics Symposium on Computer Animation 2011
• Penn Prize for Excellence in Graduate Student Teaching 2010
• Best Paper, 10th VAST International Symposium on Virtual Reality, Archaeology and Cultural Heritage 2009
• Best Poster, 1st GPU Technology Conference 2009

Technical Skills

• Motion Capture Systems: Vicon MX, Natural Point OptiTrack, Ascension ReActor, Immersion CyberGloves, Animazoo Gypsy Gro, Innalabs 3D Suit, Xsens Moven
• Multi- Modal Systems: Medilogic Sole Pressure Senors, FlexComp Biometric Sensors (EKG, GSR, Respiration, Tempeture, BVP), AMTI Force Plates, Basker Digital Cameras
• Libraries: OpenGL, DirectX, GLUT, QT, SOIL, GLM
• Operating Systems: Windows, Unix, Linux: Suse, Redhat, Ubuntu
• Languages: C, C++, Matlab, Python, CG, GLSL, CUDA, OpenCL, (Limited) Ada, Renderman Shading Language
• Application Tools: Adobe Photoshop, Vicon(Nexus, Blade, Bodybuilder), Maya, Motionbuilder, VC++

References

• Dr. Norman Badler (badler at seas.upenn.edu)
  Director, Center for Human Modeling and Simulation; Professor, Computer and Information Science, University of Pennsylvania
  
  
• Dr. Alla Safonova (alla at cis.upenn.edu)
  Assistant Professor, Computer & Information Science Dept. University of Pennsylvania.
  
  
• Amy Calhoun (cal1 at seas.upenn.edu)
  Associate Director of Digital Media Design; University of Pennsylvania
  
  
• Dr. Stephen Lane (shlane at cis.upenn.edu)
  Adjunct Professor, Computer & Information Science Dept. University of Pennsylvania.
  
  
• Dr. William Lantry (lantry at cua.edu)
  Director of Academic Services, Center for Planning and Learning Technology, Catholic University