Navigating Virtual Environments At Scale

Abstract

Using real walking for virtual exploration generally delivers most immersive VR experience, however, it is limited by the availability of physical tracking space.Virtual spaces beyond the size of tracked space are inaccessible. Limiting virtual world to match the shape and size of physical space is regressive and usually not possible. As such, to explore virtual space inaccessible with real walking, alternative free form navigation techniques like Walking-in-place, teleportation, joystick etc. should be used in-conjunction with real walking input or just by themselves. We present studies on two alternative navigation techniques (Legomotion & Dash ) that enable immersive, efficient and scaleable virtual navigation.Combining real walking with techniques like joystick input involves repeated transition from leg-based navigation to hand-based navigation that breaks immersion and could potentially lead to users abandoning real walking input as hand based navigation is often faster, easier and less tiring. Legomotion is a hybrid handsfree locomotion technique that lets users switch between real walking and walking-in-place input.Regular teleportation, because it discontinuously translates the viewpoint does not generate any optical flow, limits path integration, e.g., estimating the total distance travelled, which can cause spatial disorientation. Dash is a modified teleportation technique that quickly but continuously displaces the viewpoint as to retain some optical flow and significantly improves path integration while it does not increase cybersickness.