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Teleoperation requires both wide vision to recognize a whole workspace and fine vision to recognize the precise structure of objects which an operator wants to see. In order to achieve high operational efficiency in teleoperation, we have developed the Q stereoscopic video system which is constructed of four sets of video cameras and monitors. It requires four video channels to transmit video signals. However, four channels are not always available for a video system because of the limitation of the number of radio channels when multiple systems are used at the same time. Therefore we have tried to reduce the number of channels on this system by sending images from the right and left cameras alternately by field. In experiment 1, we compared the acuity of depth perception under three kinds of stereoscopic video systems, the original Q stereoscopic video system, the Q stereoscopic video system with two channel transmission, and the conventional stereoscopic video system. As the result of the experiment, the original Q stereoscopic video system enabled us to perceive depth most precisely, the Q stereoscopic video system with two channel transmission less so, and the conventional stereoscopic video system even less. In experiment 2, we compared the Q stereoscopic video system with two channel transmission to the original Q stereoscopic video system. The result showed that the operators were able to work more efficiently under the original Q stereoscopic video system than under the Q stereoscopic video system with two channel transmissions. In experiment 3, we compared the Q stereoscopic video system with two channel transmission to the conventional stereoscopic video system. It was found out in this study that the new stereoscopic video system we developed enabled operators to work more efficiently and to perceive depth more precisely than the conventional stereoscopic video system, although the number of channels for image transmission of this system was equal to that of the conventional stereoscopic video system.

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According to the results of the simulated teleoperation experiment, the larger the ratio of the overlapping area of stereoscopic images, the smaller the completion times and the number of errors. For this paper we did an experiment using the actual stereoscopic video system. We examined the performance of the teleoperation of an insert task in two experiments. In experiment 1, we set three fixed overlap rate conditions for the stereoscopic image pairs. (High overlap rate condition): The convergence point of the two cameras was set at the goal point where a cylindrical object was inserted. When subjects fixated their eyes on the goal point, the overlap rate of the images from the cameras was 95%. (Middle overlap rate condition): The convergence point of the cameras was set at the center of the working area. When subjects fixated their eyes on the goal points, it was 76.7%. (Low overlap rate condition): Convergence point of the camera was set at the point in the situation where the ratio of the overlapped area was 49% when subjects fixated to the goal point. Completion times and the numbers of errors of the insert task were measured. As a result, these were smallest at the high overlap rate condition. In experiment 2, we compared the performance between a fixed and a variable overlap rate conditions in a pick-and-insert task. The experimental results suggested that the number of errors of variable overlap rate condition was less than that of the fixed condition although the completion time of the former condition was not shorter than that of the latter condition.