Now you see it: Ashley’s a virtual artist

FOR Ashley Adcock, “mingling’’ with other Australian students in a virtual art gallery was just as engaging as the real thing.

FOR 12-year-old Ashley Adcock, “mingling’’ with other Australian school students in a virtual art gallery was just as engaging as the real thing.

“We are able to talk to students all around Australia and explain and show our artworks,’’ said Ashley, a Year 7 student at St Luke’s Grammar on Sydney’s northern beaches.

Ashley, who was exhibiting her pop-art painting, was particularly chuffed with her appearance as a “mevatar’’ in the virtual cloud gallery. “It is really cool.’’

Like avatars in online gaming, mevatars represent a user in a ­virtual space. While avatars are typically alter-egos or characters, mevatars stream the user’s webcam into an immersive setting in real-time to provide authentic face-to-face interactions.

Ashley joined students from across the country on Friday for the first national face-to-face ­exhibition using the cutting-edge iSee technology.

The immersive gallery featured vast, white-walled rooms adorned with art as in a physical gallery. Visitors could wander throughout, pause to appreciate individual pieces and discuss works with those around them.

Other schools sharing their artworks were Queensland’s Nambour Christian College and Saint Stephen’s College, Emmanuel & Calvin Christian School in Tasmania and Western ­Australia’s Bunbury ­Cathedral Gram­mar School.

The iSee platform was developed by the Smart Services Co-operative Research Centre with researchers from the University of Wollongong.

iSee client business innovation leader Jessica Sullivan said the tool used spatial audio, which enabled simultaneous conversations that were not possible in videoconferencing.

“A video conference call you can’t speak simultaneously only one person can talk at any given time, the other point of difference is you can move around and have all of those interactions,’’ she said.

The iSee technology would target future projects in education and the start-up sector.

The virtual art gallery is being offered through the Transforming the Education Digital Supply Chain (TtEDSC) project, which is part of the federally-funded Broadband-Enabled Education and Skills Services (BEESS) program.

TtEDSC project manager Ian Quartermaine said the aim of the virtual art show was to create collaboration between students and teachers at independent schools around the country.

“It is bringing students together and teachers together that would never be together normally and have conversations,’’ he said.

Mr Quartermaine said the plan was to offer the virtual art gallery concept up to the whole of the independent school community in Australia.