Authors:
Maxim Spur
1
;
Vincent Tourre
1
;
Erwan David
2
;
Guillaume Moreau
1
and
Patrick Le Callet
3
Affiliations:
1
Architectural and Urban Ambiances Laboratory, Centrale Nantes, Nantes, France
;
2
Department of Psychology, Goethe University Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
;
3
Polytech’Nantes, Université de Nantes, Nantes, France
Keyword(s):
Coordinated and Multiple Views, Virtual Reality, Geospatial Data Visualization, Immersive Analytics.
Abstract:
Virtual reality (VR) headsets offer a large and immersive workspace for displaying visualizations with stereoscopic vision, compared to traditional environments with monitors or printouts. The controllers for these devices further allow direct three-dimensional interaction with the virtual environment. In this paper, we make use of these advantages to implement a novel multiple and coordinated view (MCV) in the form of a vertical stack, showing tilted layers of geospatial data to facilitate an understanding of multi-layered maps. A formal study based on a use-case from urbanism that requires cross-referencing four layers of geospatial urban data augments our arguments for it by comparing it to more conventional systems similarly implemented in VR: a simpler grid of layers, and switching (blitting) layers on one map. Performance and oculometric analyses showed an advantage of the two spatial-multiplexing methods (the grid or the stack) over the temporal multiplexing in blitting. Overa
ll, users tended to prefer the stack, be ambivalent to the grid, and show dislike for the blitting map. Perhaps more interestingly, we were also able to associate preferences in systems with user characteristics and behavior.
(More)