Investigation of Surface Characteristic Effects on Real-Virtual Object Alignment in Stereoscopic Augmented Reality Images

Abstract

This paper reports a virtual pointer alignment experiment carried out in a stereoscopic augmented reality environment, in which the known conflict between binocular fusion and object interposition cues is expected to play a major role. The object was to evaluate subjects' perceptual sensitivity to target position at designated probe points on a cylindrical real object surface, visual texture of that surface, virtual pointer geometrical properties, and degree of binocular disparity. The results confirmed the primary findings from previous experiments: that both surface texture and target position have significant influences. Subjective evaluation of form of the virtual pointer revealed that the three dimensional pointer was preferred over the one and two-dimensional pointers.