Interactive Installation with Underwater Flocking Animals for Children

The main purpose of this work is to get acquainted with the phenomenon of animal flocking observed in nature and the creation of an interactive underwater simulation for children using Unity’s Data-Oriented Technology Stack (Dots) with Entity Component System (ECS). Available solutions for animal flocking that can be found on the Unity asset store and Unreal Market are examined as well. A modified version of Reynold’s Boids algorithm is used for the purposes of the simulation and a comparison between the Object Oriented Programming (OOP) approach and implementation that leverages performance using the ECS is provided. For the purposes of the interaction, an Interactive wall with motion-capture functionalities developed at Czech Technical University in Prague was used. The simulation was tested with a group that consisted of both children and adults. It was concluded that the performance gained by the usage of the ECS approach instead of a classic OOP approach is significant and opens new possibilities in real-time simulation.