Coherency between kinesthetic and visual sensation for two-handed-input in a virtual environment

Abstract

This paper is about constructing a virtual work space for performing any tasks by both hands manipulation. We intend to provide a virtual enviornment that can encourage users to accomplish any tasks as they usally act in the real environment. Our approach is using a three dimensional spatial interface device that allows the user to handle virtual objects directly by free hands and be feel-able some physical properties of the virtual objects such as contact, weight, etc. We have investigated the suitable conditions for constructing our virtual work space by simulating some basic assembly work, a Face-and-Fit task. Then select the conditions that the subjects feel most comfortable in performing this task to set up our virtual work space. Finally, we have verified the possibility to perform more complex tasks in virtual work space by providing some simple virtual models then let subjects create new models by assembling these component models together. The subjects can naturally perform assembly operations and assomplish the task. Our evoluation shows that this virtual work space has potential to be used for performing any tasks that need hands manipulation or cooperation between both hands in natural manner.