Avatar Types Matter: Review of Avatar Literature for Performance Purposes

Hudson, Irwin; Hurter, Jonathan

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-39907-2_2

Cited by 31 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…While we acknowledge the importance of behavioral realism, our work focuses on the appearance of virtual humans. Our appearance and the appearance of others in a virtual environment have notable effects on our perception (Hudson and Hurter, 2016;Freeman and Maloney, 2021).…”

Section: Perception Of Virtual Humansmentioning

confidence: 99%

Affordable But Not Cheap: A Case Study of the Effects of Two 3D-Reconstruction Methods of Virtual Humans

Bartl

Wenninger

Wolf

et al. 2021

Front. Virtual Real.

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Realistic and lifelike 3D-reconstruction of virtual humans has various exciting and important use cases. Our and others’ appearances have notable effects on ourselves and our interaction partners in virtual environments, e.g., on acceptance, preference, trust, believability, behavior (the Proteus effect), and more. Today, multiple approaches for the 3D-reconstruction of virtual humans exist. They significantly vary in terms of the degree of achievable realism, the technical complexities, and finally, the overall reconstruction costs involved. This article compares two 3D-reconstruction approaches with very different hardware requirements. The high-cost solution uses a typical complex and elaborated camera rig consisting of 94 digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) cameras. The recently developed low-cost solution uses a smartphone camera to create videos that capture multiple views of a person. Both methods use photogrammetric reconstruction and template fitting with the same template model and differ in their adaptation to the method-specific input material. Each method generates high-quality virtual humans ready to be processed, animated, and rendered by standard XR simulation and game engines such as Unreal or Unity. We compare the results of the two 3D-reconstruction methods in an immersive virtual environment against each other in a user study. Our results indicate that the virtual humans from the low-cost approach are perceived similarly to those from the high-cost approach regarding the perceived similarity to the original, human-likeness, beauty, and uncanniness, despite significant differences in the objectively measured quality. The perceived feeling of change of the own body was higher for the low-cost virtual humans. Quality differences were perceived more strongly for one’s own body than for other virtual humans.

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Section: Perception Of Virtual Humansmentioning

confidence: 99%

Affordable But Not Cheap: A Case Study of the Effects of Two 3D-Reconstruction Methods of Virtual Humans

Bartl

Wenninger

Wolf

et al. 2021

Front. Virtual Real.

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“…In the same context, the research of Banakou et al ( 2018 ) shows that embodying Albert Einstein leads to improved performance when performing cognitive tasks. The literature review proposed by Hudson and Hurter ( 2016 ) also suggests that, in a learning context, avatar appearance could impact learners' attitudes and motivation.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

From Robot to Virtual Doppelganger: Impact of Visual Fidelity of Avatars Controlled in Third-Person Perspective on Embodiment and Behavior in Immersive Virtual Environments

et al. 2019

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This study presents the second phase of a series of experiments investigating the impact of avatar visual fidelity on the sense of embodiment and users' behavior in immersive virtual environments. Our main focus concerns the similarity between users and avatars, a factor known as truthfulness. Our experiment requires the participants to control three avatars using a third-person perspective: a robot, a suit and their virtual doppelganger (virtual representation of the self). In order to analyze users' reactions and strategies, each task of the scenario of the virtual reality application can potentially affect the integrity of their characters. Our results revealed that ownership, one of the three factors of the sense of embodiment, is higher for the participants controlling their self-representation than with abstract representations. Furthermore, avatar visual fidelity seems to affect users' subjective experience, half of the panel reported having different behavior depending on the controlled character. Abstract representations allow the users to adopt more risky behaviors, while self-representations maintain a connection with the real world and encourage users to preserve the integrity of their avatar.

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“…Creating the right avatar appearance can be complex, and care needs to be taken to ensure people feel comfortable with using their avatars (Inkpen & Sedlins, 2011), as this may have serious bearings on the users' attitude and motivation (Hudson & Hurter, 2016). The degree to which people can identify with their avatar has a considerable impact on the motivational 'pull' of the technology.…”

Section: Motivating People Through Technologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital innovations in L2 motivation: Harnessing the power of the Ideal L2 Self

Adolphs

Clark

Dörnyei

et al. 2018

System

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Sustained motivation is crucial to learning a second language (L2), and one way to support this can be through the mental visualisation of ideal L2 selves (Dörnyei & Kubanyiova, 2014). This paper reports on an exploratory study which investigated the possibility of using technology to create representations of language learners' ideal L2 selves digitally. Nine Chinese learners of L2 English were invited to three semi-structured interviews to discuss their ideal L2 selves and their future language goals, as well as their opinions on several different technological approaches to representing their ideal L2 selves. Three approaches were shown to participants: (a) 2D and 3D animations, (b) Facial Overlay, and (c) Facial Mask. Within these, several iterations were also included (e.g. with/without background or context). Results indicate that 3D animation currently offers the best approach in terms of realism and animation of facial features, and improvements to Facial Overlay could lead to beneficial results in the future. Approaches using the 2D animations and the Facial Mask approach appeared to have little future potential. The descriptive details of learners' ideal L2 selves also provide preliminary directions for the development of content that might be included in future technology-based interventions.

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Avatar Types Matter: Review of Avatar Literature for Performance Purposes

Cited by 31 publications

References 19 publications

Affordable But Not Cheap: A Case Study of the Effects of Two 3D-Reconstruction Methods of Virtual Humans

Affordable But Not Cheap: A Case Study of the Effects of Two 3D-Reconstruction Methods of Virtual Humans

From Robot to Virtual Doppelganger: Impact of Visual Fidelity of Avatars Controlled in Third-Person Perspective on Embodiment and Behavior in Immersive Virtual Environments

Digital innovations in L2 motivation: Harnessing the power of the Ideal L2 Self

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