We’ll soon meet at work as avatars
During the year of the pandemic, many new ways have popped up for us to meet since we haven’t been able to see one another in person. The digital meeting has become the new normal. But an upcoming trend is the virtual meeting. “Having meetings that make use of virtual reality, as I see it, will be the new normal after the pandemic,“ says Mattias Wallergård.
Jessika Sellergren – Published 11 October 2021
Mattias Wallergård is among those on the forefront of enabling meetings to take place during the pandemic. Virtual reality is his solution for being able to meet at work. He is a researcher in interactive design at Design Sciences, LTH, and predicts that this technology will be used as a meeting solution in the workplace even after the pandemic.
It’s like meeting for real
Over the past year, Mattias Wallergård and his research colleagues have met in the world of virtual reality instead of online in front of computer screens. They have had weekly meetings to discuss and analyse their research data, something Mattias Wallergård doesn’t think would have been possible with online meetings as the only method for seeing one another. They have also taken their coffee breaks together with the Virtual Coffee Machine as their social gathering point.
“The meeting experience in virtual reality comes very close to what it feels like to meet in physical reality. It’s like meeting for real,” says Mattias Wallergård.
Reality in the virtual world means that you meet by using an avatar that moves and gesticulates just like the person behind the avatar. Unlike the digital meeting on a screen, the virtual meeting requires that the participant physically moves around, which Mattias Wallergård thinks is a health bonus.
”In relation to sitting still in front of a screen, virtual reality meetings are a healthier alternative because you have to move around for your avatar to be able to express itself with gestures and body language.”
Virtual reality in everyday gadgets
To be able to participate in a virtual meeting today, you need a virtual reality headset and a meeting platform adapted to the technology. Mattias Wallergård, though, envisions that in the near feature, we will be able to meet virtually using everyday items such as glasses and mobile phones.
“The use of virtual methods to meet was already underway before the pandemic, but it is clear that the year of corona has accelerated the development of the technology, a development that in the future will move at an even faster pace as the technology continues to be streamlined and refined,” says Mattias Wallergård.
Mattias Wallergård
Mattias Wallergård is a senior lecturer at Design Sciences, Faculty of Engineering LTH. He carries out research in the field of interaction design with a focus on the use of virtual reality and augmented reality.
Mattias Wallergård’s profile at Lund University’s Research Portal
More fun to meet as avatars
Few of us long for digital meetings, but that is not the case for researchers at the Department of Design Sciences. They have found meeting rooms that give them energy and a smart structure.