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RCC-359B - Visual Computing Lab Visual Computing Lab Schedule Click Here For The RCC-359B Visual Computing Lab Schedule For This Month. Click Here For The RCC-359B Visual Computing Lab Schedule For Next Month. Click Here for lab closedown list
 To assist with more advanced design and 3D model creation, students will be able to borrow from a pool of Wacom digital pen devices that includes Cintiq 21UX and 12WX display devices that allow students to draw directly on the screen. The collection of tablets includes the more traditional Intuos4 Wacom surfaces. For 3D modeling work, students creating 3D graphics will have access to Nextengine's Desktop 3D Scanner. The unit contains an eye-safe high-definition laser array and sensors with a high point density. The Scanner HD captures a wide colour gamut when scanning objects which is an important requirement in order to capture surfaces. In addition to the iMacs, Wacom Tablets and 3D scanner an Epson large format flatbed scanner has been added to the room. The Epson Expression 10000XL large format (12.2" x 17.2") photo scanner has 2400 dpi resolution --higher than any other B-size flatbed scanner available today - plus a 3.8 dynamic range and 48-bit color. The VCL also contains a Cannon Canoscan 4400F scanner.
The VCL has been equipped with a permanent presentation system that is unique at Ryerson University. The SMART Technologies system and LanSchool Classroom Management software provides instructional control over the software running on the lab computers, allowing Faculty to have control of what is on the students screens during lectures and allowing instructors to easily switch what is displayed on the classroom projector during lectures.  To achieve this two pieces of technology are employed in the lab. The first is LanSchool classroom management software. By employing it, teachers can actually turn off software that they don't want running on workstations during their classes. This operation is completely controlled from the lab based instructor computer and allows students to remain focused on the actual software being taught during each lab session. The software also allows the instructor control of what is on the students workstation screens during lectures, including the ability to turn them off, a useful feature during demonstrations or lecture components of classes taught in the lab. In addition instructors can easily switch what is displayed on the presentation projection system (or instructor station) during lectures including any students PC from any location in the classroom. This is useful for monitoring student activities during a class, to assist students with a problem while remaining at the front of the class or to display any of the classrooms work on the classroom presentation system. Online LacSchool tutorials can be found at http://www.lanschool.com/support/tutorials. The second technology installed in the VCL is a SMART Board 600i interactive whiteboard system. It's a 77” whiteboard with a projector built in and its surface is interactive. It can act as a stand alone projector. It can be used as a standard whiteboard using electronic pens. Or it's touch sensitive surface can be employed as a mouse that interacts with the classrooms instructor computer during software training sessions. The projector is rated at 1500 lumens, uses DLP® technology by Texas Instruments® and features Vikuiti™ Super Close Projection technology from 3M which minimizes glare from the projectors lens and minimizes shadows cast by the instructor. In this environment instructors do not have to change their teaching style. Teachers can operate at the front desk with the Instructor computer utilizing the projector function only or they can make use of the interactive whiteboard replacing the mouse with their fingers to activate software menu's directly from the surface of the whiteboard board. Or they can use the electronic pens provided as a standard whiteboard. They can combine any functions including using the whiteboard pens to draw over projections or combine the touch interactivity with the pens and projector. The unit installed is height adjustable with speakers built in and like any other projector there are multiple inputs into the projector system for projection of video and other media. In combination with the LanSchool classroom management software, the Interactive Whiteboard System makes the Visual Computing Lab the best computer lab on campus to teach in from a teaching and learning perspective.The lab was re-built in 2006 with the teaching in learning process as a key design factor. Faculty teaching in the room will find they are no more than four rows away from any student and they can access any student via wide aisles and make use of a unique walkway down the center of the classroom to garner better student interaction. Hardware
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Visual Computing Lab (RCC-359B) - was orignally established as a 20 seat lab in 1997 to support advanced graphic design, 3D animation and the compositing needs of students in both the Graduate and Undergraduate programs offered by FCAD schools. Today the lab services Image Arts, RTA, Interior Design, Journalism and Professional Communications. Accessible 24 hours a day the lab contains thirty-four iMacs with large 27" screens. Loaded with technology required to do advanced media work, the iMacs are equipped with 2.8GHz Quad-Core Intel i7 CPU's, 8GB of RAM, 2TB Drives, ATI Radeon HD 4850 512MB video cards, and 8x DVD SuperDrives. The computers are equipped with full sized Apple keyboards that include the numeric keypad required for many of the labs software shortcuts. The large screen size, quad core processing, video cards, SD media capability and DVD output lend themselves to the unique curricular requirements for the Visual Computing Lab that includes print, multimedia/web design, 3D applications and rendering. The iMac's are set to dual boot into either OSX or Windows 7 so faculty and students will have access to the operating system of their choice to undertake production work. The computers are connected to the RCC network at gigabit speeds and are locaed in the countries first media lab to be connected to 10 gigabit-capable network wiring.
This amount of disk space, network speed and interconnectivity comes in handy when using the many design tools that are available in the lab. Software on the 64bit Windows 7 partition includes; Microsoft Office 2010, Audacity, GNU Image Manipulation Program (Gimp), Acrobat Pro 9, Quicktime, Itunes, Citrix ICA Client To Access To VAPPS (Adobe CS3, MS Office 2007, Matlab), Adobe Web Premium, After Effects, Adobe Air, Second Life, VLC, Google Sketchup, Google Earth, Firefox, Windows Media Player, Windows Media Encoder, Filezilla, Expression Encoder, UniteCast, Skype, Android SDK for Windows, Android Tools for Eclipse, Google Chrome, Visual Studio Express C#, Visual Studio Express Visual Basic, XNA Game Studio 3.1, Blender, Tandberg Movi, 3D Studio Max, Real Player, Microsoft Touch Pack for Windows 7, Processing, Basic Stamp, CD Burner XP, Personal Brain, Eclipse, Deep Freeze, MS Messenger, MarcEdit, Windows Movie Maker, Smedge, Maya Unlimited, LanSchool, Internet Explorer. Browser Plugins for Firefox include: Acrobat Pro, Delicous Bookmarks, FireFTP, FlickFox, Web Developer, Java, Shockwave, Flash, Quicktime Plugin, Shareaholic, Share Video and Silverlight.
Software on the OSX Snow Leopard 10.6.4 partition includes; iTunes + Sound Effects, iPhoto, iMovie HD, iDVD, iWeb, GarageBand, Safari, Front Row, Photo Booth, Microsoft Word 2008, Microsoft Powerpoint 2008, Microsoft Excel 2008, QuickTime Pro, Adobe Web Premium, After Effects CS 5, QuickTime Broadcaster, Adobe Acrobat Pro, Arduino, Open Office, Basic Stamp, Audacity, Processing, Eclipse SDK, FireFox, Flip4Mac, Keyspan Serial Assitant , Personal Brain, Fritzing, Phidget Libraries, rEFIT, SecondLife, Google Sketchup, VLC, OSX Citrix Client/VAPPS, QuickTime Broadcaster, Android SDK, Android Tools For Eclipse, Fugu, Filezilla, Google Earth, Google Chrome, Comic Life, Liquid CD, SnapDragon AR, iClone, Yemu, Blender, Skype, Adobe Air, Xcod, Iphone SDK, Pencil, Personal Brain, CMAP Tool, Eagle Light, Phidget Libraries, MAX/MSP/Jitter, Iclone and Flip4Mac. Browser plugins include: Windows Media Plugin, Java, Shockwave Flash, Acrobat Pro, Quicktime Plugin, Delicous Bookmarks, FireFTP, FlickFox, simpledelicous, Web Developer, Shockwave, Shareaholic, Share This, Share Video (Vod Pod) and the Facebook Toolbar.