Experiment of virtual space distance education system using the objects of cultural heritage

Lecture exchanges are increasing year by year. To promote this distance education systems have been developed and put into practical use. As a step further, a virtual space distance education platform called HyperClass has been proposed. HyperClass is a class where a teacher and students who are at different locations, in reality their avatars, are brought together through the communication network, and they can have classes and do cooperative work as if they were attending the same classroom. Any multimedia materials for education can be introduced into HyperClass. HyperClass is based on HyperReality (HR). HR is the concept of combination of virtual reality and real reality. A prototype system for HyperClass has been developed and the 3D (three dimensional) objects of Japanese heritage were introduced into HyperClass. To evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of HyperClass, an experiment has been carried out by interconnecting between Waseda University and Victoria University of Wellington through the Internet. Good results have been obtained