With the advent of very powerful PCs and high-end graphics cards, there has been an incredible development in Virtual Worlds, real-time computer animation and simulation, games. But at the same time, new and cheaper Virtual Reality devices have appeared allowing an interaction with these real-time Virtual Worlds and even with real worlds through Augmented Reality. Three-dimensional characters, especially Virtual Humans are now of an exceptional quality, which allows to use them in the movie industry. But this is only a beginning, as with the development of Artificial Intelligence and Agent technology, these characters will become more and more autonomous and even intelligent. They will inhabit the Virtual Worlds in a Virtual Life together with animals and plants.

Computer Animation & Virtual Worlds is the first journal to address this global thematic of the Virtual Worlds. This thematic has been subdivided into 6 areas:

    Computer animation
    Embodied agents
    Virtual Environments
    Augmented Reality
    Virtual Life
    Visualization

Computer Animation & Virtual Worlds seeks papers in all fields of Virtual Worlds. Contributions are solicited describing original research results, applications, and experience in the following topics:

Computer Animation

    2D animation
    Keyframe animation
    Inverse kinematics
    Biomechanics models
    Motion capture and motion retargeting
    Physical-based animation
    Facial and body animation
    Path planning
    Cloth and hair animation
    LOD and impostors
    Real-time rendering

Augmented Reality

    Tracking
    Mobile AR systems
    Virtual Heritage

Embodied Agents

    Perceptual models
    Virtual Sensors
    Interagent communication
    Modelling of groups and crowds
    Conversational agents
    Goal driven behavior
    Interaction with Virtual Humans
    Intelligent virtual actors
    Social behavior
    Emotions and personality
    Autonomous Virtual Human architectures
    Simulation involving Virtual Humans
    Autonomous Virtual Humans in games

Virtual Environments

    Gesture and action recognition
    Haptic interfaces
    Audiospace
    Simulators (flight, car drive etc…)
    VR for emergency
    VR for psychiatry
    VR for rehabilitation
    Virtual surgery

Virtual Life

    Plant development and growing
    L-systems
    Artificial animals and animats
    Population generation
    Virtual cities
    Persistent worlds

Visualization

    Medical imaging and reconstruction
    Molecular graphics
    Fluid visualization
    Visualization of physical phenomena
    Volume rendering