Geospatial Visualization in Place

Geospatial Visualization In Place:
New Opportunities with Augmented Reality

Mark Billinghurst
HIT Lab NZ
University of Canterbury

  Professional solutions available
  Autodesk REVIST, ESRI ArcGIS, Grass,etc

Emerging Novel User Interfaces
  Stereo Visualization
  Multi-touch screens
  Smartphones

VisionSpace

Next Generation Immersive Visualization

Limitations
  Complex interfaces
  Unintuitive interaction
  2D display for 3D content
  Separation from the real world
  Remote visualization

Augmented Reality (Azuma 97)
  Combines Real and Virtual Images
-  Both can be seen at the same time
  Interactive in real-time
-  The virtual content can be interacted with
  Registered in 3D
-  Virtual objects appear fixed in space

Augmented Reality Examples
  Put AR pictures here

AR and Geospatial Visualization
  Enhanced Maps
  AR overlay on printed material
  Outdoor AR
  In place visualization
  Mobile AR
  Sensor Visualization
  Sensor data shown in place

AR Markerless Tracking

  OPIRA Library
  Uses natural features for tracking
  Fast, robust performance

Interactive AR Maps
  Markerless tracking
  3D model overlay
  Gesture input

Outdoor AR
  Highly accurate outdoor AR
tracking system
  GPS, Inertial, RTK system
  HMD
  First prototype
  Laptop based
  2-3 cm accuracy

Image Registration

AR Stakeout Application

Mobile AR - Hardware

GPS
Example self-built working
Antenna
solution with PCI-based 3D graphics

PCI 3D Graphics Board

Tracker
Controller
PC104 Sound Card

DC to DC
Wearable
Converter CPU
Computer
PC104 PCMCIA

Battery

GPS RTK Hard Drive
correction
Radio

Serial
Ports

Columbia Touring Machine

2008 - Location Aware Phones

Motorola Droid Nokia Navigator

Real World Information Overlay
  Tag real world locations
  GPS + Compass input
  Overlay graphics data on live video
  Applications
  Travel guide, Advertising, etc
  Eg: Mobilizy Wikitude
  Android based, Public API released
  Other companies
  Layar, AcrossAir, Tochnidot, RobotVision, etc

Layar – www.layar.com
  iPhone, Android
  > 2 million downloads
  1500+ information layers

HIT Lab NZ Outdoor AR Platform
  Cross platform
  Android, iPhone
  3D onsite visualization
  Intuitive user interface
  Positions content in space
  Camera, GPS, compass
  Client/Server software architecture
  Targeting museum guide/outdoor site applications

Prototype: Earthquake Reconstruction

  See past, present and future building designs
  Earthquake survivor stories shown on map view
  Collect user comments
  Android platform

Client/Server Architecture
Web Interface

Add models

Web application java
and php server

Android

application

Database server

Postgres

Hydrosys Project (TU Graz)
  http://www.hydrosysonline.eu/
  Smart Earth visualization
  Sensor network
  Handheld AR display

Research Directions
  User Interface
  Wide Area Tracking
  Information Filtering
  Application Evaluation
  Social Networking

AR Navigation
  Many commercial AR browsers
  Information in place
  How to navigate to POI

2D vs. AR Navigation?

VS

AR Navigation Study
  Users navigate between Points of Interest
  Three conditions
  AR: Using only an AR view
  2D-map: Using only a top down 2D map view
  AR+2D-map: Using both an AR and 2D map view
  Experiment Measures
  Quantitative
-  Time taken, Distance travelled
  Qualitative
-  Experimenter observations, Navigation behavior, Interviews
-  User surveys, workload (NASA TLX)

HIT Lab NZ Test Platform – AR View

HIT Lab NZ Platform – Map View

Distance and Time

No significant differences

Paths Travelled
  Red – AR
  Blue – AR + Map
  Yellow - Map

Navigation Behaviour
  Depends on interface
  Map doesn’t show
short cuts

User Comments
  AR
  “you don't know exactly where you are all of the time.”
  “using AR I found it difficult to see where I was going”
  Map
  “you were able to get a sense of where you were”
  “you are actually able to see the physical objects around you”
  AR+MAP
  “I used the map at the beginning to understand where the
buildings were and the AR between each point”
  “You can choose a direction with AR and find the shortest way
using the map.”

Usability Issues
  Screen readability in sunlight
  GPS inaccuracies
  Compass errors
  Touch screen difficulties
  No routing information

Lessons Learned
  User adapt navigation behaviour to guide type
  AR interface shows shortcuts
  Map interface good for planning
  Include map view in AR interface
  2D exocentric, and 3D egocentric
  Allow people to easily change between views
  May use Map far away, AR close
  Difficult to accurately show depth

Conclusions
•  AR allows for GeoSpatial Visualization in Place
•  Hardware and software platforms widely available
•  Many possible applications/commercial possibilities
•  Important research problems need to be solved
– Wide area tracking
– User experience
– Information presentation/filtering
– Etc..

More Information

•  Mark Billinghurst

–  mark.billinghurst@hitlabnz.org

•  Website

–  www.hitlabnz.org

Geospatial Visualization in Place

More Related Content

What's hot

Similar to Geospatial Visualization in Place

More from Mark Billinghurst

Recently uploaded

Geospatial Visualization in Place