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Welcome aboard!

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Welcome aboard!

The computational light laboratory conducts research and development in light related sciences, including computer-generated holography, computer graphics, computational imaging, computational displays and visual perception.

Our core mission is to show our societies that there can be better services, experiences, and goods that serve the benefits of humanity by using light. We are here to invent the next in light-based techniques and unlock the mystery of light.

We build our tools to perform work and invent new methods to improve state of the art. Most importantly, we document our steps so that the others can follow. Finally, we release our work to the public on our GitHub organization. We have multiple social media outlets to promote our work. These include our Twitter account, our LinkedIn account, our YouTube account and our webpage. We don't shy away from going public and participate in public demonstrations with our prototypes.

I wholeheartedly welcome every member at every stage to the Computational light laboratory. We can improve the state of the world, and I need your help in doing that!

Kaan Akşit

Getting aboard!

In the rest of this documentation, you will find a checklist that will help you establish yourself as a member of the Computational light laboratory. There is also an additional subsection that provides a list of suggestions to help you get you to establish collaborative work ethics. Note that this and the other documents that you will find on this website are always subject to change. In fact, as a member, please do not hesitate to suggest improvements and be the change by actually having a pull request in the source repository.

Checklist

  • Are you full registered for the graduate programme? Is all the administrator work done? Relevant contact: cs.phdadmissions@ucl.ac.uk.
  • Do you know when you will receive your first paycheck? Relevant contact: cs.phdadmissions@ucl.ac.uk.
  • Do you have a UCL identity card? Relevant contact: securitysystems@ucl.ac.uk.
  • Do you know which building is our office building? Reach out to Kaan or any other member and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com.
  • Can you get into the building where our office is using your UCL identity card? Relevant contact: facilities@cs.ucl.ac.uk.
  • Do you have a desk and a chair reserved for you in the office? Relevant contact: facilities@cs.ucl.ac.uk.
  • Do you know where Kaan's office is? Reach out to Kaan or any other member and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com.
  • Do you know where our laboratory space is? Reach out to Kaan or any other member and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com.
  • Do you have a computer to conduct your research? Reach out to Kaan and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com. For queries such as where to get a display mount, cable for this and that, try reaching out to facilities@cs.ucl.ac.uk.
  • Do you have access to remote computational resources that you may be needing in your work? Reach out to Kaan and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com.
  • Do you have access to hardware resources that you may be needing in your work? Reach out to Kaan and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com.
  • Make sure to meet other members. Send emails! They are listed on this website. Ask about their experiences and thoughts. Explore what they are conducting in their research.
  • Make sure to discuss with Kaan Akşit to see how you can contribute to Odak in the near future.
  • Do you know what you will be focusing on? Do you know what projects are carried out in the team? Are you up-to-date with what the team has achieved recently?
  • Are you listed as a member in the GitHub organization? In that organization which team do you belong to? Reach out to Kaan and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com.
  • Do you have a weekly 1:1 meeting arranged with Kaan? Reach out to Kaan and ask, kaanaksit@kaanksit.com.
  • Are you receiving calendar invitations for weekly group meetings? Reach out to Kaan or any other team member and ask, kaanaksit@kaanaksit.com.
  • Do you have a research plan? What are your goals? How will your research impact the society in the near and far future? Tinker deeply in a structured manner. Agree with Kaan and your other supervisors. Reach out to them and initiate conversations about your roadmap towards your degree.
  • Do you know where you can find the term dates and closures? Visit this website and this website for more.
  • Do you know where you can book the meeting room 402 at 169 Euston Road? Visit CMIS GO system for booking purposes.

Suggestions

These are some suggestions to help you get establishing yourself as a collaborative member of the group.

  • Install software that helps you send emails. With that software, make sure you can schedule emails. Please do not send emails to people you don't know well outside 8 am to 6 pm (unless they are in a different time zone).

  • Life brings many challenges, and not all days are sunny. Even if communication degrades over time, keep the kindness. Control yourself. Never say anything that you will regret! (Life is not war)

  • We are all collaborators. The best things happen when people collaborate. Being a Swiss knife is good, but there isn't a leader in history that leads no one. There was no human on this planet can exist by themself.

  • Avoid unnecessary communication, leave others room to organize themselves.

  • If you are angry, stand up and walk. Take a break, be somewhere else for some time. When it is time, and you are calm, come back.

  • Smile, stand up, walk, be kind and love yourself, and respect yourself.

  • Know yourself!

  • Spend time to understand things if you want to be an expert in the topic. Do not worry about how much it takes, but worry if you don't understand.

  • You will be exposed to noise most of the time in your communications. Improve your filters to extract useful information.

  • Do it now if you can. Tomorrow will arrive with new tasks.

  • The work is not complete until it is complete. Don't be handwavy. Ensure that you provide a working solution (not an "it can work easily in the next step" solution).

  • Research impact means the beneficial application of expertise, knowledge, analysis or discovery. It can also be described as an effect on change or benefit to the economy, society, culture, public policy or services, health, the environment or quality of life beyond academia.

  • Build it. They will come.