In a user study comparing four visualization methods for three-dimensional vector data, participants used visualizations from each method to perform five simple but representative tasks: 1) determining whether a given point was a critical point, 2) determining the type of a critical point, 3) determining whether an integral curve would advect through two points, 4) determining whether swirling movement is present at a point, and 5) determining whether the vector field is moving faster at one point than another. The visualization methods were line and tube representations of integral curves with both monoscopic and stereoscopic viewing. While participants reported a preference for stereo lines, quantitative results showed performance among the tasks varied by method. Users performed all tasks better with methods that: 1) gave a clear representation with no perceived occlusion, 2) clearly visualized curve speed and direction information, and 3) provided fewer rich 3D cues (e.g., shading, polygonal arrows, overlap cues, and surface textures). These results provide quantitative support for anecdotal evidence on visualization methods. The tasks and testing framework also give a basis for comparing other visualization methods, for creating more effective methods, and for defining additional tasks to explore further the tradeoffs among the methods.

We present the design of Lineogrammer, a diagram-drawing system motivated by the immediacy and fluidity of pencil-drawing. We attempted for Lineogrammer to feel like a modeless diagramming "medium" in which stylus input is immediately interpreted as a command, text label or a drawing element, and drawing elements snap to or sculpt from existing elements. An inferred dual representation allows geometric diagram elements, no matter how they were entered, to be manipulated at granularities ranging from vertices to lines to shapes. We also integrate lightweight tools, based on rulers and construction lines, for controlling higher-level diagram attributes, such as symmetry and alignment. We include preliminary usability observations to help identify areas of strength and weakness with this approach.

We present a participant study that compares biological exploration tasks using volume renderings of laser confocal microscopy data across three environments which vary in level of immersion. For the tasks, data, and visualization approach used in our study, we found that subjects qualitatively preferred and quantitatively performed better in environments with greater levels of immersion. Subjects performed real-world biological data analysis tasks that emphasized understanding spatial relationships including characterizing the general features in a volume, identifying co-located features, and reporting geometric relationships such as whether clusters of cells were coplanar. After analyzing data in each environment, subjects were asked to choose which environment they wanted to analyze additional data sets in--subjects uniformly selected the Cave environment.

We present a range of novel interactions enabled by a simple modification in the design of a computer mouse. By converting each mouse button to pop through tactile push-buttons, similar to the focus/shutter-release buttons used in many cameras, users can feel, and the computer can sense, two distinct "clicks" corresponding to pressing lightly and pressing firmly to pop through. Despite the prototypical status of our hardware and software implementations, our current pop through mouse interactions are compelling and warrant further investigation. In particular, we demonstrate that pop through buttons not only yield an additional button activation state that is composable with, or even preferable to, techniques such as double-clicking, but also can endow a qualitatively novel user experience when meaningfully and consistently applied. We propose a number of software guidelines that may provide a consistent, systemic benefit; for example, light pressure may invoke default interaction (short menu), and firm pressure may supply more detail (long menu).

We present an immersive system for exploring numerically simulated flow data through a model of a coronary artery graft. This tightly-coupled interdisciplinary project is aimed at understanding how to reduce the failure rate of these grafts. The visualization system provides a mechanism for exploring the effect of changes to the geometry, to the flow, and for exploring potential sources of future lesions. The system uses gestural and voice interactions exclusively, moving away from more traditional windows/icons/menus/point-and-click (WIMP) interfaces. We present an example session using the system and discuss our experiences developing, testing, and using it. We describe some of the interaction and rendering techniques that we experimented with and describe their level of success. Our experience suggests that systems like this are exciting to clinical researchers, but conclusive evidence of their value is not yet available.

We present a novel approach to controlling a virtual 3D camera with a 2D mouse or stylus input device that is based on gestural interaction.Our approach to 3D camera manipulation, UniCam, requires only a single-button stylus or mouse to directly invoke specific camera operations within a single 3D view.No 2D widgets or keyboard modifiers are necessary.By gesturally invoking all camera functionality, UniCam reduces the modal nature of typical desktop 3D graphics applications, since remaining mouse or stylus buttons can be used for other application functionality.In addition, the particular choice and refinement of UniCam controls efficiently enables a wide range of camera manipulation tasks, including translation in three-dimensions, orbiting about a point, animated focusing on an object surface, animated navigation around an object, zooming in upon a region, and saving and restoring viewpoints.UniCam's efficiency derives primarily from improved transitions between techniques and to a lesser degree from adaptations of existing techniques.Although we have conducted no formal user evaluations, UniCam is the result of years of iterative development with approximately one hundred users.During this time more conventional modifier key and menu-based implementations were implemented and either refined or rejected.Informally, users appear to require a few hours of training to become proficient with UniCam controls, but then typically choose them almost exclusively even when widget-based controls, such as those provided by an Inventor viewer, are simultaneously available.

Article The music notepad Share on Authors: Andrew Forsberg Brown University, Department of Computer Science, Providence, RI Brown University, Department of Computer Science, Providence, RIView Profile , Mark Dieterich Brown University, Department of Computer Science, Providence, RI Brown University, Department of Computer Science, Providence, RIView Profile , Robert Zeleznik Brown University, Department of Computer Science, Providence, RI Brown University, Department of Computer Science, Providence, RIView Profile Authors Info & Claims UIST '98: Proceedings of the 11th annual ACM symposium on User interface software and technologyNovember 1998 Pages 203–210https://doi.org/10.1145/288392.288608Published:01 November 1998 51citation901DownloadsMetricsTotal Citations51Total Downloads901Last 12 Months16Last 6 weeks4 Get Citation AlertsNew Citation Alert added!This alert has been successfully added and will be sent to:You will be notified whenever a record that you have chosen has been cited.To manage your alert preferences, click on the button below.Manage my AlertsNew Citation Alert!Please log in to your account Save to BinderSave to BinderCreate a New BinderNameCancelCreateExport CitationPublisher SiteGet Access

This paper presents a set of interaction techniques for use in headtracked immersive virtual environments.With these techniques, the user interacts with the 2D projections that 3D objects in the scene make on his image plane.The desktop analog is the use of a mouse to interact with objects in a 3D scene based on their projections on the monitor screen.Participants in an immersive environment can use the techniques we discuss for object selection, object manipulation, and user navigation in virtual environments.

We explore a range of techniques that use two hands to control two independent cursors to perform operations in 3D desktop applications. Based on research results in 2D applications, we believe that two-handed input provides the potential for creating more efficient and more fluid interfaces, especially for tasks that are context-sensitive or that have many degrees of freedom. These tasks appear frequently in 3D applications and are commonly broken down into a series of sequential operations, each controlling fewer degrees of freedom -- even though this may dramatically change the character of the task. However, two-handed interaction, in theory, makes it possible to perform the same tasks using half the number of sequential steps since two previously sequential operations can be performed simultaneously. In addition, many forms of two-handed interaction may be simpler to use and to understand since they correspond to common interactions in the physical world. It is significant when ta...

We present two novel techniques for effectively selecting objects in immersive virtual environments using a single 6 DOF magnetic tracker. These techniques advance the state of the art in that they exploit the participant's visual frame of reference and fully utilize the position and orientation data from the tracker to improve accuracy of the selection task. Preliminary results from pilot usability studies validate our designs. Finally, the two techniques combine to compensate for each other's weaknesses. KEYWORDS: interaction, selection, immersive virtual environments, direct-manipulation, 3D widgets. INTRODUCTION Selection techniques indicate to an application which object or objects a participant wishes to interact with in a virtual environment (VE). We present two novel techniques for selecting objects in a VE called aperture and orientation. The techniques apply to our test application, an immersive VE for visualizing a computational fluid-dynamics dataset in which users selec...