An interesting feature of the Microsoft Kinect depth sensor is the occasional/spurious appearance of 'orbs' in the infra-red camera output.  A number of reports have been made about this, and we have seen them a few times ourselves when working with the device.  Setting aside the heated discussion as to what these 'orbs' are (as they cannot be normally seen by the naked eye), it would be interesting to see how the depth sensor component of the Kinect interprets these anomalies (ie in terms of the resulting point-cloud data).

To this end, we would like you to Design-Build-Test an application that detects orbs in the infra-red camera image, and upon detection, it triggers a recorder, so that the Kinect's point-cloud data output and infra-red video output is captured to disk.

Although the artefact (ie your software) will be a key deliverable, we will also need to see:

• a requirements specification and plan, developed through background research/study and discussions with your supervisor
• a detailed and reasoned software design
• a development plan/log based on the above design
• a test strategy and log, showing the planned approach to verification and the results of your tests.  As a part of this, you will need to include a method for 'cheating' the Kinect sensor using an infra-red element of a scene that is not in the visible spectrum.

Ciocarlan et al (Ciocarlan, 2018), developed a wellbeing game that utlised some of Cialdini's well-known principles of influence and persuasion (Cialdini 1984) to persuade players to perform real-world acts of kindness.  The artefact was used to address a number of research questions including the impact on subjective wellbeing.  Although this was a significant piece of ongoing research, the artefact they used would make an interesting muse for a Minecraft mod.  Although Ciocarlan et al's results were inconclusive, the results could be used as a steer to scope-down to something achievable in the timescale for a Computing project.

This would be a DBT project, so research on the effectiveness of the artefact in behaviour change would NOT be required.

Experience of Minecraft modding, as well as keen interests in Persuasion Psychology and Positive Psychology would be needed to do something worthwhile in the timescale available to you.  Are you persuaded?

Due to the ubiquitous and pervasive nature of mobile devices they are prone to being exposed to a wide variety of potentially hazardous environments and situations. There is a growing interest in being able to monitor and detect exposure to such environments. An example of this is the inclusion of water ingress detectors in many mobile devices that change colour when exposed to water. 

This project aims to extend the kinds of hazards that can be detected by mobile devices. In particular it should look at impact forces and generate notifications of potentially harmful forces. The project would consist of development and evaluation of potential detection techniques using existing sensors and to develop a working prototype logging and notification application.

The project will address the issue of excess sedentary behaviours typically undertaken by gamers. The project may consists of the following:

 - Undertake a critical literature review of sedentary behaviour interventions and examine their effectiveness
 - Develop a novel technology driven sedentary behaviour intervention on gamers.
 - Evaluate the effectiveness of this newly developed intervention.

This project will investigate the feasibility of using Evolutionary Computation to generate QR codes which contain aesthetically appealing patterns or shapes. 

QR codes typically appear to contain a random black and white grid of squares. However this pattern is carefully crafted to ensure that a URL can be encoded in a robust fashion. Its therefore very difficult to create a QR code with a desirable pattern or structure.

This project will attempt to create QR codes that contain patterns of black and white squares that form an identifiable pattern or shape that is aesthetically appealing. The resulting QR codes may have a significant commercial value as compared to apparently randomly generated codes.