EDGE: Experiential Design and Gaming Environment Lab

Project Summary

The widespread use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) is having a major impact on every aspect of media production, communication, business, design and entertainment. Ubiquitous wireless networks, next-generation mobile communications/display technologies, locative/physical sensing, virtual social worlds and innovative software applications herald the approach of pervasive computing embedded in every aspect of our lives. Beyond console and computer-based activity, game-related and goal-oriented media are being integrated into education, advertising and broadcast media and these new ICTs are collectively referred to as mixed-reality environments.

The Experiential Design and Gaming Environment (EDGE) environment, composed of satellite research facilities, connected via wireless and fibre optic links to indoor and outdoor performance venues within and around the Ryerson campus, will be used to conduct research on experiential and gaming media in urban mixed-reality environments.

EDGE provides urgently needed infrastructure to allow Canadian researchers to understand, prototype, experiment and create new ways to participate in this landscape. As a unique facility in Canada, and comparable to a select few labs world-wide, the EDGE environment combines the resources necessary to develop and study applications at the intersection of developing technologically embedded social and cultural practices, and shifting economic landscapes. More specifically, the EDGE infrastructure provides researchers with a rapid prototyping lab; a virtual world development lab; portable networking units, design tools, modular electronics facilities in an experimental monitoring space, as well as indoor and outdoor deployment environments. The research-team will use this infrastructure to develop and study mixed-reality applications in small trials and urban deployments, to create and evaluate integrated software/hardware/networking/business paradigms as they relate to real-world use.

EDGE Lab Members

  • Dimitrios Androutsos, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
  • Alexandra Bal, School of Image Arts
  • Deborah Fels, School of Information Technology Management
  • Abby A. Goodrum, School of Journalism
  • Matt Gorbet, School of Radio & Television Arts
  • Richard Lachman, School of Radio & Television Arts
  • Eddie Law, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
  • Jason Nolan, School of Early Childhood Education