entornos multimedia de realidad aumentada en el campo del arte

Scottish Online Journal of e-Learning ISSN: 1749-950X Vol.1(1)
SOJEL, http://www.sojel.co.uk
LIVE LEGO HOUSE, A MIXED REALITY SPACE
FOR THE EDUTAINMENT
Cristina Portalés
Laboratorio de Luz
Universidad Politécnica de Valencia
Camino de Vera s/n
46022 Valencia (Spain)
Telephone number: (0034) 963877007
E-mail: criporri@doctor.upv.es
Abstract
Gaming is a natural way of learning and multimedia technologies bring new possibilities in the
field of edutainment. Live LEGO House in an interactive space to explore coexistence and
multicultural factors through gaming based on the Mixed Reality (MXR) technology. The
system consists basically on a physical/real house built with the LEGO blocks, which is
enriched with different non-physical/virtual multimedia files, including sounds, videos and 3D
animations with multicultural content. Children interact with the house via two dolls, each of
them having different characteristics and needs. They (children) will need to agree in some
aspects in order to play the game properly, to coexist. Tactile, visual and auditory stimuli are
present in the game.
Keywords: mixed reality, interaction, edutainment, technology.
1. Introduction
Edutainment (also educational entertainment or entertainment-education) is a form of
entertainment designed to educate as well as to amuse. Edutainment typically seeks
to instruct or socialize its audience by embedding lessons in some familiar form of
entertainment: television programs, computer and video games, films, music,
websites, multimedia software, etc. Most often, edutainment seeks either to tutor in
one or more specific subjects, or to change behaviour by engendering specific sociocultural
attitudes. Successful edutainment is discernible by the fact that learning
becomes fun and teachers or speakers educate an audience in a manner which is
both engaging and amusing (Wikipedia, 2007).
Multimedia technologies have demonstrated a great potential in the field of
education, since they offer an excellent technological base for the training and
transmission of knowledge, which generates more efficient methodologies of
education and learning. Equally in the area of entertainment and leisure, these
technologies open new perspectives that offer new chances in this important human
facet.
Live LEGO House (LLH) is an interactive game for children based on the MXR
technology, which takes great advantage of multimedia systems (sounds, images,
videos, etc.). It is thought to entertain as the same time as to educate in the area of
coexistence and multicultural factors. Nevertheless, education is not explicit, as no
rules are necessary to play. Two dolls – led by two children – will have to interact
with the house, discovering a place where plenty of sounds, videos and 3D virtual
objects will respond to their acts. But actions do have consequences, so they have to
decide what to do: what they want or what seems to be better for both.
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