The development of virtual reality (VR) technology has allowed virtual museums to enrich experiences of personal memories. In this work, we first conducted a survey study to understand the way people use to record, store, and share their digital memories. Informed by the results, we present MemoryVR, a personal virtual museum system designed to preserve and share digital memories. It allows individuals to organize and share their own memories in a virtual museum environment and to visit the memory spaces of others in an immersive way. We invited participants to experience MemoryVR and analyzed their behavior and expectations. The evaluation results showed that users perceived excellent pragmatic and hedonic qualities of MemoryVR. Participants found their experiences of memories in personal virtual museums to be fulfilling. Additionally, we gathered suggestions from participants about MemoryVR, providing design recommendations for customized personal virtual museums.

The viewing experience of 3D artifacts in Virtual Reality (VR) museums is constrained and affected by various factors, such as pedestal height, viewing distance, and object scale. User experiences regarding these factors can vary subjectively, making it difficult to identify a universal optimal solution. In this paper, we collect empirical data on user-determined parameters for the optimal viewing experience in VR museums. By modeling users' viewing behaviors in VR museums, we derive predictive functions that configure the pedestal height, calculate the optimal viewing distance, and adjust the appropriate handheld scale for the optimal viewing experience. This led to our novel 3D responsive design, ResponsiveView. Similar to the responsive web design that automatically adjusts for different screen sizes, ResponsiveView automatically adjusts the parameters in the VR environment to facilitate users' viewing experience. The design has been validated with two popular inputs available in current commercial VR devices: controller-based interactions and hand tracking, demonstrating enhanced viewing experience in VR museums.

Museum visitors are typically advised to follow trajectories planned by curators. Nevertheless, the diverse locomotion techniques available in Virtual Reality (VR) offer various navigation methods that are unattainable within physical museum spaces. Interestingly, these techniques have rarely been explored within museum settings. Our study aims to investigate appropriate navigation methods in VR museums. We first conducted a study in a virtual reconstruction of a local museum with the following navigation methods: a 2D minimap, a World-in-Miniature (WiM) system, and a WiM map. Our results showed that the WiM map with a point-and-select interaction technique outperformed the other two regarding ease of learning, reduced workload, lessened motion sickness, and greater user preferences. Based on the findings, we improved the WiM map and introduced MagicMap. It builds upon the WiM map and translates the curatorial principles of museum visiting into a hierarchical menu layout. Our further evaluation showed that MagicMap supported prolonged engagement in VR museums, enhanced system usability and overall user experience, and reduced users’ perceived workload. Our findings have implications for the future design of navigation systems in VR museums and complex indoor environments.