Solid evidence of virtual reality’s benefits has graduated from impressive visual demonstrations
to producing results in practical applications.Further,a realistic experience is no
longer immersion’s sole asset. Empirical studies show that various components of
immersion provide other benefits—full immersion is not always necessary.
INITIAL VR ADVANTAGES
Users react strongly when first experiencing immersive
VR. Seeing the stereoscopic graphics pop out of the
screen, picking up a virtual object with their real hand,
and realizing that head movements change their view of
the virtual world all provide a unique experience. Users
comment that immersive VR offers a different experience
than interacting with 3D applications on desktop
PCs or gaming consoles.
Military training
VR training provides a level of realism not possible in
the classroom, as well as higher flexibility and reduced
cost compared to real-world exercises. Recently, the success
of VR military training has led to the adoption of
VR technologies for other types of training—in the medical
field in particular.
SECRETS OF THEIR SUCCESS
One answer is that they all rely on the realistic experience
that immersive VEs provide to the user.
Specifically, they require a high level of sensory fidelity—
visual, auditory, and other sensory cues similar to those
experienced in the real world. They require the user’s
experience in the virtual world to match, as closely as
possible, the simulated real-world experience.
Immersion and Presence
• Immersion refers to the objective level of sensory
fidelity a VR system provides.
• Presence refers to a user’s subjective psychological
response to a VR system.
A VR system’s level of immersion depends only on
the system’s rendering software and display technology
(including all types of sensory displays). Immersion
is objective and measurable—one system can have a
higher level of immersion than another.
Presence, on the other hand, is an individual and
context-dependent user response, related to the
experience of “being there.” Different users can experience
different levels of presence with the same VR
system, and a single user might experience different
levels of presence with the same system at different
times, depending on state of mind, recent history,
and other factors.
Consider the level of visual immersion—how close
the system’s visual output is to real-world visual stimuli.
Even though visual immersion is only one part of the
overall level of immersion, this factor has many components,
including
• field of view (FOV)—the size of the visual field (in
degrees of visual angle) that can be viewed instantaneously,
• field of regard (FOR)—the total size of the visual field
(in degrees of visual angle) surrounding the user,
• display size,
• display resolution,
• stereoscopy—the display of different images to each
eye to provide an additional depth cue,
• head-based rendering—the display of images based
on the physical position and orientation of the user’s
head (produced by head tracking),
• realism of lighting,
• frame rate, and
• refresh rate.
References:
IEEEXplore - This paper appears in:
Date of Publication: July 2007
Author(s): Bowman, D.A.
Virginia Tech, Blacksburg
