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Visual Distance Estimation in Static Compared to Moving Virtual Scenes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 April 2014

Harald Frenz  and
Markus Lappe
Harald Frenz*
Affiliation:
Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Germany
Markus Lappe
Affiliation:
Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Germany
*
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Harald Frenz, Allgemeine und angewandte Psychologie, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, 48149 Münster, Germany. E-mail: frenzh@uni-muenster.de
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Abstract

Visual motion is used to control direction and speed of self-motion and time-to-contact with an obstacle. In earlier work, we found that human subjects can discriminate between the distances of different visually simulated self-motions in a virtual scene. Distance indication in terms of an exocentric interval adjustment task, however, revealed linear correlation between perceived and indicated distances but with a profound distance underestimation. One possible explanation for this underestimation is the perception of visual space in virtual environments. Humans perceive visual space in natural scenes as curved, and distances are increasingly underestimated with increasing distance from the observer. Such spatial compression may also exist in our virtual environment. We therefore surveyed perceived visual space in a static virtual scene. We asked observers to compare two horizontal depth intervals, similar to experiments performed in natural space. Subjects had to indicate the size of one depth interval relative to a second interval. Our observers perceived visual space in the virtual environment as compressed, similar to the perception found in natural scenes. However, the nonlinear depth function we found can not explain the observed distance underestimation of visual simulated self-motions in the same environment.

El movimiento visual se emplea en el control de la dirección y la velocidad de la auto-locomoción y, también, para conocer el tiempo de contacto con un obstáculo. En trabajos anteriores encontramos que los observadores humanos pueden discriminar entre las distancias de diferentes auto-locomociones simuladas visualmente en una escena virtual. La indicación de la distancia mediante una tarea de ajuste de intervalo exocéntrico, sin embargo, reveló una correlación lineal entre las distancias percibidas y las indicadas, pero con una gran subestimación de la distancia. Una posible explicación de esta subestimación se basa en las características de la percepción visual del espacio en ambientes virtuales. En las escenas naturales los humanos percibimos el espacio visual como curvado, y las distancias se subestiman con el incremento de la separación respecto al observador. Esta compresión espacial también puede existir en nuestro ambiente virtual. Por ello, se decidió evaluar el espacio visual percibido en una escena estática virtual. Pedimos a los observadores que comparasen dos intervalos de profundidad horizontal, similares a experimentos llevados a cabo en el espacio natural. Los sujetos debían indicar el tamaño de un intervalo de profundidad con respecto a un segundo intervalo. Nuestros observadores percibían el espacio visual en el ambiente virtual como comprimido, similar a la percepción encontrada en escenas naturales. Sin embargo, la función no lineal de profundidad que encontramos no puede explicar la subestimación observada de la distancia de las auto-locomociones visuales simuladas en el mismo ambiente.

Keywords

virtual environmentspace perceptiondepth cuesambiente virtualpercepción del espacioclaves de profundidad
Type
Monographic Section: Spatial Vision and Visual Space
Information
The Spanish Journal of Psychology , Volume 9 , Issue 2 , November 2006 , pp. 321 - 331
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2006

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