A student in all black demonstrates new technology.

Center for Immersive Media

 

The Center for Immersive Media (CIM) at University of the Arts is a place where students and faculty can explore the opportunities and implications of what it means for ourselves to be immersed in data, simulations, stories, performances and digital communities.

This creative research facility is dedicated to the fields of virtual and mixed reality, performance motion-capture and human-computer interaction, through collaboration across visual and performing arts disciplines.

 

Research & Creative Activity

The CIM Team

Alan Price headshot
Alan Price

Director, Center for Immersive Media

Headshot of Kevin Merinsky
Kevin Merinsky

Creative Technology Specialist

Cody Smith
Cody Smith

Windows Support Specialist

Headshot Joe Kennedy
Joe Kennedy '22

Fellow, Center for Immersive Media

Students, Faculty & Collaborators

The Center for Immersive Media extends it's abilities by engaging and working with a wide range of collaborators. Partners both internal and external help us to produce engaging creative works and thoughtful research.

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Our Students
  • ​​​​​​Eden Blas 
  • Tyler Bell
  • Rachael Domin
  • Angel Hall
  • Aspen Nell
  • Kiara Koerper-Williams
  • Nicole Diaz
  • Sarina Eyring
  • Monica Hill (mocap performer)
  • Khamari Louissaint (mocap performer)
Guest Artists
  • Miwa Matreyek
  • John Luna
External Partners
  • Trish Maunder
  • David New
  • Katherine Allen
  • Bon Ku
  • Matt Fields

Courses

FAQ

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Can I declare a major at the CIM?

The CIM is not a degree program, and does not have a structured curriculum that provides the necessary foundations and skills to pursue a career or specialization. Immersive media, and specifically VR, is not a discipline in itself, but is a format, genre, or technology that can be applied in many different disciplines. If you are an aspiring designer, artist, choreographer, composer, or performer, UArts offers degree programs in which you can develop the expertise to be successful in those fields, and by incorporating opportunities that the CIM provides to everyone, you have the ability to include VR and immersive media in your creative toolset.

How can I get involved with the CIM?

The easiest and most direct way is to take a course offered at the CIM. This can lead to opportunities including work-study positions and internships working on CIM projects sponsored by the university and through external grants and partnerships, and can help advance your professional experience. Advanced undergraduate and graduate students may submit proposals for independent or collaborative work fullfing your degree requirements. Ask your program director or faculty that you work with about integrating technology available at the CIM and how it can support your academic work.

Who can take a CIM course?

CIM courses are open to students in any discipline without prerequisites; however, we recommend that you spend your freshman year studying in your degree program before taking a CIM course. This will allow you to connect to your creative practice, and to make sure that you find relevance to your work so that you can effectively explore and challenge the boundaries of your medium. Students should have a clear understanding of concepts and project ideas in order to take full advantage of opportunities available at the CIM.

What are CIM courses like?

Most courses are studios with students from a range of disciplines and interests. Courses typically meet in the computer lab at the CIM and explore new technologies requiring an aptitude for learning new software, hardware and techniques. Team projects in the courses can provide invaluable experience for collaborating with students in other disciplines. While you learn new technologies and concepts, you will be asked to explore how it relates to your chosen degree and disciplines of interest. See current and past course offerings.

Who teaches courses at the CIM?

Courses are taught by faculty and visiting artists who relate or connect their own artistic research and practice to immersive media. Topics and concepts are driven by interests that augment or explore boundaries of traditional or conventional practices. CIM courses are an opportunity for both students and faculty to explore new ways of thinking and making.

Can I book or rent the facilities at the CIM?

In general, the facilities are not available for individual or group performance or exhibition that is not a direct outcome of work developed at the CIM. As a research center, the facilities are dedicated to ongoing production. Public events occuring at the CIM are part of the center's programming and is curated to represent the mission and activities of the CIM, and opportunities to include work in events are through a process of calls for participation and invitation.

About

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Our Mission

The mission of the center is to connect, engage and be a catalyst for creativity with

  • faculty, through creative research, collaboration, teaching and grant partnerships.
  • students, through learning, team projects and production internship experience.
  • the professional community, through collaboration, projects and grant partnerships.
  • research and development, through continuous adoption of, and training on, new technologies.

Immersive media not only refers to current trends in consumer-based virtual reality headsets and the history of immersive installations, but is also descriptive of our increasingly mediated society and lifestyles in entertainment, social interaction and professions. Designing for media experiences and consumption must accommodate increasingly mobile, integrated and networked systems. 

The center is a place to explore opportunities and implications of what it means for ourselves to be immersed in data, simulations, stories, performances and digital communities. 

Technologies that become more integrated with our senses, our bodies and identity must be humane, and artists, authors, composers and choreographers have creative and critical sensibilities that can anticipate and illuminate meaningful ways of engaging with emerging and future media technologies.

Our Facilities

The 5,600-square-foot facility is dedicated to exploring the fields of virtual and mixed reality, performance motion-capture and human-computer interaction. The facilities include:

  • 40' x 40' square, 14' high truss and open floor area, including:
    • optical motion capture system for full body performance capture and location-based VR applications
    • multiple video projectors
    • lighting instruments with adjustable zoom and color
    • four channel audio system
    • station with control surfaces for all of the above
    • blackout curtains surrounding the truss
  • 16 station computing classroom with PCs optimized for real time computer graphics rendering.
  • Two large project rooms with ceiling grids for development of installations and virtual environments.

 

Production equipment in the facilities will expand as the center takes shape, but currently includes:

  • Large Scale LED Display approximately 16'x10' and accompanying video processing hardware.
  • Multiple VR Head Mount Display systems (Vive Pro, Oculus Rift S, Quest, Go).
  • Additional trackers for Vive Pro.
  • Insta360 Camera capable of 360 degree VR video, stereoscopic and live streaming capabilities.
  • Multiple short-throw and standard-throw video projectors.

Contact

Street address:
310 S 13th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19107
 

The center is located in University of the Arts' Juniper Hall. The main entrance for guests is on the east side of the building through a small parking lot. Students and guests may also enter by way of the CIM classroom through the Juniper Hall residential lobby entrance.

Contact the Center for Immersive Media at cim@uarts.edu