Working in virtual reality

But there was a worse problem. When the company trialled software that would visually detail the process in 3D, some instructions were found to be incorrect. It was a graphic illustration of how virtual reality software can eliminate mistakes and failures, as well as make complex data user-friendly.

That’s something Auckland company Right Hemisphere well knows.  It’s an elder statesman in New Zealand’s 3D visualisation industry, with blue chip customers like Boeing and Bell Helicopter using its graphics management software. Its technology is being applied to a range of sectors by Nextspace.

This company was set up with government backing to be a 3D industry catalyst, ensuring local companies and educational and research organisations benefit from Right Hemisphere’s products.

Nextspace’s CEO Gavin Lennox says Right Hemisphere’s technology is proving invaluable in maintenance of expensive industrial plants. It’s being used by heavy industry 3D specialists Revisia Ltd to create animated, 3D models of plant equipment at New Zealand Steel’s Glenbrook mill.

“Revisia’s application of the technology provides a visual record of what is involved in taking equipment apart, which speeds up the process and makes it more efficient because staff know exactly what to do. That represents savings of tens of thousands of dollars in lost production when plant is off line,” says Lennox.

Another focus for Nextspace is creating tomorrow’s 3D literate workforce. It has so far helped 10 education institutions around New Zealand integrate Right Hemisphere’s technology into their curriculum.

“We used to communicate purely in text, then it was possible to add pictures almost seamlessly. Future generations will use 3D graphics just as easily.”

Motovated Design

When Greg Morehouse, CEO of virtual prototyping company Motovated Design and Analysis, moved to Christchurch from the United States in the 1990s, he found a vibrant engineering industry based on the old fashioned approach of ‘take a guess, build a model and see if it works’.

He bought different skills having studied finite elements analysis – a simulation technique for evaluating structural performance – at university in the US. After graduating, Morehouse worked for Boeing and Hercules Aerospace, specialising in virtual prototyping and stress analysis. There was plenty of demand for his experience in New Zealand.

“Preparing 3D CAD drawings is something most engineering firms can and should do themselves, but you need an expert to do the analysis and validation. Design without analysis is like pilots without instruments – they can fly but might not know exactly where they are!

“Unless you are analysing designs every day, it’s difficult to accurately understand exactly what the information is telling you. It’s not the upfront problems – they’ll be obvious. It’s knowing what part of the machine or process is at risk of failing three years down the track.”

Motovated Design carries out virtual prototyping for companies all over the world but helping world jet sprint champion Peter Caughey to win and retain his title is one job it does out of sheer passion. The New Zealand title holder approached the company a couple of years ago wanting to improve his performance on the water.

“The usual approach is to increase horsepower but we decided to focus on the jet unit, using our virtual prototyping and analysis experience to work out how he could go faster,” says Morehouse.

Not only did Caughey win the world title in 2009, Motovated’s computer animations of jet sprint boats were broadcast around the globe by local television networks, giving viewers the kind of experience pioneered during real time 3D animations of America’s Cup racing.

Matrix

Auckland’s Matrix Applied Computing has cutting edge expertise in 3D technology that will reveal performance limits or defects. It specialises in computational fluid dynamics, a means of simulating the way fluid flows move and interact. The results are displayed visually as well as numerically, allowing Matrix to find and fix problematic flows and improve plant performance and reliability.

Matrix has a 25-year track record, first offering engineering computer services back in the days before there were PCs. Today it carries out physics modelling to solve issues worldwide. In Kuwait, for example, the company determined if a 140-metre oil flare stack that had partially collapsed was safe to continue in service.

Matrix has completed more than 1,000 projects involving computer simulation. While product design and plant performance are core activities, its expertise can be applied to pretty much anything, even preventing heart failure.

Auckland surgeon Dr William Peters had come up with a new kind of internal heart pump for people awaiting transplants. His idea was a cuff that wraps around the aorta and inflates and deflates a membrane. This would reduce strain on the heart by doing some of the work of pumping blood through the system.

Dr Peters formed a company called Sunshine Heart to develop the unit but, when it consistently failed within a week during testing on sheep, Matrix was called in to help. The goal was longevity of 10 years, says Matrix’s principal engineering analyst, Don Campbell.

“It was a complex job, not just because of the challenges of simulating the surgeon’s actions in a small space but particularly because we had to simulate a continuous process of inflating and deflating the membrane. A key to success was understanding the level of stress on the membrane over time.”

Amazingly, the finite element analysis models produced by Matrix worked first time. So far, five patients have had the C-Pulse device implanted and the durability of the design has been proven through testing.

“We’ve been running devices day and night for years now and the C-Pulse is still going strong,” says Sunshine Heart’s Scott Miller.

Ebonz

Scientists at the University of Auckland’s Bioengineering Institute are among the first in the world to develop computer models of parts of the human body.

Led by Professor Peter Hunter, the team’s long-term goal is to make complete, customised models of individual humans to help with medical diagnosis, surgery and the design of body implants.

Anatomically-based models of joints are already being produced by an institute start-up company, eBonz.

The research underpinning eBonz’s intellectual property began in the late 1990s when, explains Duane Malcolm, students took a plastic skeleton apart and began digitising the various bones.

That work has progressed to a stage where it’s possible to combine those bone images with data from an MRI or CT scan, and gait analysis information, to model the forces acting inside a knee joint in an individual patient.

eBonz’s technology is both novel and quite functionally accurate says Malcolm. The company is currently refining an online tool that will allow clinicians to enter patient-specific data and receive assessments and predictions relevant to that individual.

The goal is to cut the time it takes to create an individual patient model to around 10 or 20 minutes. The resulting information allows doctors to see the stresses acting at different points and predict what is likely to happen.

“That guides the interventions they might recommend, such as a knee brace or an implant or orthotics in the shoes,” says Malcolm.

“Ultimately we will be able to model the benefits of other actions such as losing weight, or getting rid of the stairs in your house, or walking as opposed to running.”

More information:

www.nextspace.co.nz

www.righthemisphere.com

www.revisia.com

www.motovated.co.nz

www.matrix.co.nz

www.ebonz.co.nz

This article was originally published as 'Working in 3D virtual reality' in Bright magazine, August / September, Issue 35.