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Human Walking in Virtual Environments pp 221–240Cite as

Implementing Walking in Virtual Environments

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Abstract

In the previous chapter, locomotion devices have been described, which prevent displacements in the real world while a user is walking. In this chapter we explain different strategies, which allow users to actually move through the real-world, while these physical displacements are mapped to motions of the camera in the virtual environment (VE) in order to support unlimited omnidirectional walking. Transferring a user’s head movements from a physical workspace to a virtual scene is an essential component of any immersive VE. This chapter describes the pipeline of transformations from tracked real-world coordinates to coordinates of the VE. The chapter starts with an overview of different approaches for virtual walking, and gives an introduction to tracking volumes, coordinate systems and transformations required to set up a workspace for implementing virtual walking. The chapter continues with the traditional isometric mapping found in most immersive VEs, with special emphasis on combining walking in a restricted interaction volume via reference coordinates with virtual traveling metaphors (e.g., flying). Advanced mappings are then introduced with user-centric coordinates, which provide a basis to guide users on different paths in the physical workspace than what they experience in the virtual world.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    While most immersive VEs implement head tracking for visual feedback, some laboratories also implement tracking of other body parts to provide virtual body feedback or interaction methods.

  2. 2.

    Some tracking systems use quaternions as their native reporting format, which provides an alternative representation of the transformations, and can be converted from and to the angular notation used in this chapter [21].

  3. 3.

    Depending on the display system (e.g., head-mounted displays or immersive projection technologies) the actual positions or orientations of computer graphics camera objects are usually specified relative to these head coordinates, such as transformations from the head center to the eye displays [25].

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Acknowledgments

The authors of this work are supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG 29160962).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Human-Computer-Media, University of Würzburg, Campus Nord, Oswald-Külpe-Weg 82, D-97074 , Würzburg, Germany

    Gerd Bruder & Frank Steinicke

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  1. Gerd Bruder
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  2. Frank Steinicke
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Gerd Bruder .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Würzburg, Oswald-Külpe-Weg 82, Würzburg, 97074, Germany

    Frank Steinicke

  2. Drexel University, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineerin, Philadelphia, 19104, Pennsylvania, USA

    Yon Visell

  3. University of Toronto,  Toronto Rehabilitation Institute, Univ, University Ave 550, Toronto, M5G 2A2, Ontario, Canada

    Jennifer Campos

  4. Computer Science and Control (INRIA), National Institute for Research in, Campus de Beaulie, Rennes Cedex, 35042, France

    Anatole Lécuyer

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Bruder, G., Steinicke, F. (2013). Implementing Walking in Virtual Environments. In: Steinicke, F., Visell, Y., Campos, J., Lécuyer, A. (eds) Human Walking in Virtual Environments. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8432-6_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8432-6_10

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  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4419-8431-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4419-8432-6

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