USC ACAD 288 · Interaction design & development
IYH waypoint navigation
A navigation system for the Iovine and Young Hall digital twin. Click a floor position to move through the scene, drag to look around, or select a saved viewpoint.
Python · NVIDIA Omniverse Kit · OpenUSD
A 60 fps rendered tour of IYH, opening on the lettered staircase. See Live interaction for the click-to-travel system in use.
System design
The interface sends navigation events to Python extensions inside Kit. The extensions handle movement and camera selection, so the same controls can work across different USD scenes.
- InputFloor click, look gesture, or destination selection
- Kit eventsCoordinates, drag deltas, or a camera path
- NavigationSurface picking, camera easing, and viewpoint lookup
- USD cameraUpdate the travel camera or activate a saved view
| Interaction | Event | System response |
|---|---|---|
| Click to travel | travelClick | Cast a ray through the cursor, accept a floor hit, then ease the camera toward it at eye height. |
| Drag to look | lookDrag | Turn the camera using pointer deltas while preserving its position and limiting vertical rotation. |
| Saved viewpoint | teleportToWaypoint | Select a camera discovered under /Waypoints and make it the active view. |
Separate movement from the model
The travel camera lives in a temporary USD session layer. Moving through the building does not change its source geometry or overwrite the saved destination cameras. Back restores the previous camera pose.
Adapt to the scene
The warehouse uses Y-up; IYH uses Z-up. The integration adjusts the movement axis, eye height, and accepted floor elevations. Scene changes cancel active travel and clear the previous scene’s navigation history.
My contribution
I developed the waypoint and smooth-travel extensions in a warehouse test scene. The IYH integration, surface picking, and replacement interface shown here were completed later for this portfolio with Codex assistance.
The Iovine and Young Hall model was built by our ACAD 288 class. The warehouse is an NVIDIA sample environment.
Direct camera travel does not include collision-aware route planning. Some assets and materials remain missing from the recovered class scene.