DOCTORAATSPROEFSCHRIFT - EDM - UHasselt

10 Outline
and their lack of generality. An overview of related work concerning interaction
modeling is provided in Chapter 4. Next, Chapter 5 presents the first
version of the interactive object approach for NVEs, which is based on object
generalization and utilizes a feature modeling approach. It is designed to
support run-time adjustable interactions between all interactive objects in the
virtual world by a single interaction mechanism. How interactive objects are
simulated and controlled are also discussed. Finally, Chapter 6 concludes this
Part with some general remarks and gives pointers to improve realism.
The third Part elaborates on how our interactive object platform can be
extended to support more realistic interactions. Chapter 7 explains how dynamic
animations and simulations can be used to provide more realism for
interactions. The related work is discussed in Chapter 8. In Chapter 9 we
present ExtReAM, a new animation and simulation library that can easily be
extended with new animation techniques and is easy to integrate. Chapter 10
then discusses how ExtReAM is integrated in the interactive object approach,
enabling new animation and simulation functionality and resulting in more
realistic dynamic interactions. Our findings are given in Chapter 11.
Part IV discusses the HCI part of the interaction process. Chapter 12 elaborates
on the link between interaction techniques, interaction and embodiment
animation. Also it discusses how more natural interaction techniques can improve
the acceptance of VR for a larger audience and how it increases the user’s
feeling of being immersed in the virtual world. Chapter 13 presents related
work in the field of 3D interaction techniques and defines the concepts of presence
and workload and describes some of the most important methodologies
for measuring these. In Chapter 14 we discuss how dynamic inverse kinematic
animation can support more realistic avatar interactions in virtual worlds. As
we discussed earlier, dynamic animations are often avoided in NVEs since they
require more networking resources than predefined animations. Therefore, we
will also elaborate on how this new interaction technique can be distributed
as efficiently as possible. Thereafter, in Chapter 15 we discuss how rigid-body
simulation can be exploited to generate haptic feedback forces. Furthermore,
we present a haptic travel method that allows users to navigate through a
virtual world while receiving haptic feedback on what happens to their virtual
counterpart. After presenting the technique, we evaluate the approach in a
formal experiment that analyzes the influence of haptics on the user’s feeling
of immersion and workload during travel in a virtual world in Chapter 16.
Conclusions for this component of our research are given in Chapter 17.
Part V discusses the overall conclusions of this dissertation. Furthermore,
pointers for further research are given.