Intuitive navigation method in 3D information space with portable information terminal using the movement of the terminal and the finger gesture of the user

本研究旨在提出一种使用便携式信息终端在三维信息空间中进行直观导航的方法。Handy Window是一种直观的交互方式，用于在用户的PIT和其他无处不在的设备之间交换信息。该方法由用户手指操作的对象操作和PIT移动的目标设备选择组成。在我们的设计中，包括PIT在内的每个设备周围都有一个3D信息空间，可共享的3D信息对象被放置在该空间中。用户可以通过使PIT靠近设备来浏览特定设备的信息空间。此外，可以使用手指动作在PIT和设备之间交换共享信息空间中的对象。建立了一个原型系统的评价与CCD相机，三维运动传感器，和超声波测距传感器。结果表明，该方法比传统的GUI方法提供了更直观的交互效果，在三维信息空间中的基本操作是移动视点位置、改变视点方向、选择、移动和旋转对象。我们的研究集中在这些一般操作映射到用户输入动作在移动的环境。我们评估了操作-动作映射的直观性和效率。因此，最合适的映射如下：通过改变终端位置来移动视图位置，通过改变终端方向来改变视图方向，以及通过拾取或抓握手势来操作对象。我们使用不同的控制-显示比、终端移动与视觉反馈变化的比值来测量信息导航的性能。实验结果表明，控制显示比的适当取值可以使系统的性能得到改善。

This research aims to propose an intuitive navigation method in 3-D information space using portable information terminal. Handy Window is an interface for the intuitive interaction method to exchange information between user's PIT and the other ubiquitous devices. This method consists of the object manipulation with the user's finger action and the target device selection with the movement of the PIT. In our design, there is a 3D information space surrounding each device including the PIT, and the sharable 3D information objects are placed in that space. The user can browse a certain device's information space by bringing the PIT close to the device. In addition, object in the shared information space can be exchanged between the PIT and the device with using the finger action. A prototype system for evaluation was built with a CCD camera, a 3D motion sensor, and a supersonic distance measuring sensor. The result showed that the proposed method provided more intuitive interaction than the traditional method of GUI.Primitive operations in 3D information space are moving view position, changing view direction, and selecting, moving and rotating an object. Our study focuses on the mapping these general operations to user input actions in mobile environment. We evaluated the intuition and efficiency of the operation-action mappings. As a result, the most appropriate mapping is followings ; moving view position by changing terminal position, changing view direction by changing terminal direction, and operating an object by picking or grasping gesture. We measured the performance of information navigation using a various value of control-display ratio, ratio of the movement of the terminal to the change of the visual feedback. As the results, we found some value of control-display ratio could make the performance better.