The Perceived Naturalness of Virtual Locomotion Methods Devoid of Explicit Leg Movements

Abstract

Walking-In-Place (WIP) techniques have potential in terms of solving the problem arising when an immersive virtual environment offers a larger freedom of movement than the physical environment. Such techniques are particularly useful when the spatial constraints are very prominent, as they are likely to be in relation to immersive gaming systems located in the homes of consumers. However, most existing WIP techniques rely on movement of the legs which may cause users, wearing a head mounted display, to unintentionally move. This paper details a within-subjects study performed with the intention of investigating how two alternative types of gestural input relying on arm and hip movements compare to the traditional WIP gesture and keyboard input. Visual feedback was delivered through a head-mounted display and auditory feedback was provided by means of a 16-channel surround sound system. The gestures were evaluated in terms of perceived naturalness, presence and real world positional drift. The results suggest that both WIP and arm swinging are perceived as significantly more natural than hip movement and the keyboard configuration. However, arm swinging better matched real walking in terms of energy expenditure and led to significantly less positional drift.

Walking in Place Through Virtual Worlds

“…However, considering that the general aim of WIP techniques is to provide an alternative to real walking, it seems meaningful for research on WIP locomotion to focus more explicitly on how we increase the perceived naturalness of the walking experience; i.e., how we can make the experience of navigating through virtual worlds using WIP techniques feel more like the real thing. Specifically, we have argued that when striving to increase the perceived naturalness of WIP locomotion, it is meaningful to take as the point of departure, the degree of correspondence between the sensorimotor loop of real walking and walking in place [15]. This view has led us to focus on two distinct, albeit interconnected questions: (1) How can we increase the perceived naturalness of the actions perform by the user during WIP locomotion?…”

“…The first study (n=27 ) [14] compared three gestures: the common WIP gesture, Wiping (alternately bending each knee as if wiping the feet on a doormat), and Tapping (alternately tapping each heel against the ground). The second study [15] (n=20 ) was focused on gestures devoid of explicit leg motion and compared four gestures: the common WIP gesture, Hip Movement (alternately swinging the hips to the left and right), Arm Swinging (alternately swinging each arm back and forth), and keyboard input (while standing the user pressed a button to move). In both studies the participants performed a simple walking task requiring them to walk along a predefined path within a scenic virtual environment.…”

“…These techniques enable user's to travel through virtual worlds by performing stepping-like moments on the spot that serve as a proxy for real steps. Particularly, we present a taxonomy of virtual travel tecniques, review past work on WIP locomotion, and summarize our recent work which has sought to increase the perceived naturalness of WIP locomotion [14][15][16][17][18][19][20].…”

A comparison of different methods for reducing the unintended positional drift accompanying walking-in-place locomotion

“…The authors argues that the reason why this gesture led to significantly less drift most likely is that the participants while walking straight did not break contact with the ground. Nilsson, Serafin and Nordahl [17] recently performed a IEEE Symposium on 3D User Interfaces 2014 29 -30 March, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA 978-1-4799-3624-3/14/$31.00 ©2014 IEEE similar study comparing four different input methods for WIP locomotion: 1) The common WIP gesture. 2) A gesture where the user alternatively swings the hip to the right and left while keeping both feet grounded.…”

“…In all conditions the users relied on the traditional stepping in place gesture for generating virtual movement. This gesture was chosen since it seemingly is the type of gestural input that leads to the largest amounts of UPD [16,17]. The participants were instructed to walk at a steady and comfortable pace; to stay on the path to the extent that it was possible; and to refrain from stopping or walking in the opposite direction.…”