Literature review on virtual tour technology

Résumé du document

Numerous developments in virtual technologies show up in modern world creating for people more and more comforts and possibilities. Different kinds of visions that we may see with the help of virtual tour technology, have elevated the status of virtual environment to the level of pop iconography, and some of those associated with the technology have arguably risen to star status. While this work provided many suggestions, the importance of improved computer generation of multimodal images and advancements in hardware technologies that support interface devices were stressed, as was improvement in the general comfort associated with donning these devices. As the following sections will discuss, the former objectives have largely been met by astounding technological advances, yet the latter has yet to be fully realized, as virtual tour users are still impeded by cumbersome devices and binding tethers. In particular, current project provides literature review of technology that greatly appeals University and Real Estate industry, virtual tour (VT) technology. The latter shortly represents digital (often online) tour of а location (actual or fictional) composed of а varying degree of images and other media. Tours often are comprised of digital photographs, panoramas, text, and even sounds. Generally, а virtual tour evokes the sense of moving or walking through the location. And that point will be outlined throughout the paper along with the number of key recommendations put forth by Durlach and Mavor (1995). Virtual tours are driven by the technology that is used to design and build these systems. This technology consists of the human—machine interface devices that are used to present multimodal information and sense the virtual world, as well as the hardware and software used to generate the virtual environment. It also includes the techniques and electromechanical systems used in telerobotics, which can be transferred to the design of VT systems, as well as the communication networks that can be used to transform VT systems into shared virtual worlds.

Extraits

[...] CHI '97 workshop. ACM SIGCHI Bulletin Kalawsky, R. S. (1999). VRUSE—а computerized diagnostic tool: For usability evaluation of virtual/synthetic environments systems. Applied Ergonomics, Kanellos, M. (2000, January 28). Chips embark on road to 20 gigahertz. CnetNews. Com [Online]. Available: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003- 200-1534900.html 17. Kaur, K. (1999). [...]

[...] Stanney, Mourant and Kennedy (1998, p. 330) suggest that: justify the use of VT technology for а given task, when compared to alternative approaches, the use of а VT should improve task performance when transferred to the real-world task because the VT system capitalizes on а fundamental and distinctively human sensory, perceptual, information processing, or cognitive capability. Yet there is very limited understanding of the types of tasks or activities for which the unique characteristics of VEs can be leveraged to provide significant gains in human performance, knowledge, or experience. [...]

[...] Scanner design and resolution tradeoffs for miniature scanning displays [Online]. Available: http://www.mvis.com/urey_phototonics_wp.htm 38. Varile, G., & Zampolli, А. (Eds. (1998). Survey of the state of the art in human language technology: Studies in natural language processing. New York: Cambridge University Press Waller, D. А. (1999). An assessment of individual difference in spatial knowledge of real and virtual environments. Unpublished doctor dissertation, University of Washington. [...]

[...] Photorealistic rendering tools are evolving toward full-featured physics- based global illumination rendering systems. Such physically based rendering techniques allow quantitative prediction of the illumination in а virtual scene and generation of photorealistic computer images, in which illumination effects such as soft shadows and glossy reflections are reproduced with high fidelity (Suykens, 1999). Computer generation of autonomous agents is а key component of many VT applications involving interaction with other entities, such as adversaries, instructors, or partners. There has been significant research and development in modeling embodied autonomous agents. [...]

[...] Stanney, Mollaghasemi, and Reeves (2000) used this taxonomy as the foundation on which to develop an automated system, MAUVE (Multi-Criteria Assessment of Usability for Virtual Environments), which organizes VT usability characteristics into two primary usability attributes (VT system usability and VT user considerations); four secondary attributes (interaction, multimodal system output, engagement, and side effects); and 11 tertiary attributes (navigation, user movement, object selection and manipulation, visual output, auditory output, haptic output, presence, immersion, comfort, sickness, and aftereffects). Similar to the manner in which traditional heuristic evaluations are conducted, MAUVE can be used at various stages in the usability engineering life cycle, from initial storyboard design to final evaluation and testing. It can also be used to compare system design alternatives. The results of а MAUVE evaluation not only identify а system's problematic usability components and techniques, but also indicate why they are problematic. [...]