Development of a Virtual Reality System: CompleXcope Y. Tamura, A.Kageyama and T.Sato Theory and Computer Simulation Center National Institute for Fusion Science Toki 509-5292, Japan tamura@tcsc.nifs.ac.jp Abstract One of the most practical objectives to use virtual reality system in science is to make it easy to in- tuitively percept complex physical phenomena. At Theory and Computer Simulation Center (TCSC), National Institute for Fusion Science, a virtual reality system, called CompleXcope, was developed. This virtual reality system can represent “real” 3D environment, not pseudo 3D. Since attractive phenomena become more and more complex, it becomes unavoidable recognize by using “real” 3D visualization tools. In out CompleXcope system, OpenGL makes images and CAVE library makes virtual image (stereo image). Some applications produced by this system are presented. 1. Introduction A virtual reality system for scientific visualization, that we call CompleXcope, is proposed. The CompleXcope system is based on CAVE system that is developed at Electronic Visualization Laboratory, University of Illinois at Chicago. In resent days, many tools to visualize various models have been developed and used in many fields. Above all, in physics field, such tools are indispensable to comprehend physical phenomena and cultivate the frontier science of complexity. But it becomes too uneconomical to analyze complex phenomena by using traditional 2D visualization tools, because they ought to be dealt with highly nonlinear, dynamic and large-scale simulation models. The output data generated by advanced supercomputers is huge. Moreover, it often happens that interesting phenomena occur lo- cally, both in time and space. So it is highly required to recognize them in "real" 3D environment and in real time and explore their detailed evolutions. The purpose of this study is to develop a viable virtual reality system and to present scientific applications demonstrating the viability and practicability for comprehension of complex evolution of physi- cal phenomena. 2. System Configuration CompleXcope is a projection-based V R system based on CA VE system. This system has four screens whose size is 10 foot x 10foot. The screens are arranged in a cube made up of three rear-projection screens for walls and a down- projection screen for the ground. The correct stereoscopic perspective projections are calculated by a graphic worksta- tion (SGI ONYX2) in real time. This workstation has four graphic pipelines to control four screens. A master viewer, who can only control 3D environment, wears stereo liquid crystal shutter glasses and a six-degrees-of-freedom head- tracking device. The workstation redraws images of each wall in response to change of head position. The glasses also have infrared sensor. The role of this sensor is to synchronize image with shutter timing. If the shutter of right eye is