* Mirabelle.Dcruz@nottingham.ac.uk+www.vr-hyperspace.eu

Demonstration: VR-HYPERSPACE- The Innovative Use of Virtual Reality to Increase Comfort by Changing the Perception of Self and Space

Mirabelle D’Cruz *

Harshada Patel

Laura Lewis

Sue Cobb

The University of Nottingham UK

Matthias Bues

Oliver Stefani

Tredeaux Grobler

Fraunhofer Institute forIndustrial Engineering

Germany

Kaj Helin

Juhani Viitaniemi

Susanna Aromaa

VTT Technical Research Centre of

Finland

Bernd Fröhlich

Stephan Beck

André Kunert

Alexander Kulik

Bauhaus-UniversitätWeimar

Germany

Ioannis Karaseitanidis

Panagiotis Psonis

Nikos Frangakis

Institute of Communications and Computer Systems

Greece

Mel Slater

Ilias Bergstrom

Konstantina Kilteni

Elena Kokkinara

University of Barcelona Spain

Betty Mohler

Markus Leyrer

Florian Soyka

Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics Germany

Enrico Gaia

Domenico Tedone

Thales Alenia Space Italia S.p.A Italy

Michael Olbert

Mario Cappitelli

Airbus Group Innovations (former EADS Innovation works

Germany)

Abstract: Air Transport Year 2050 and Beyond

Our vision is that regardless of future variations in the interior of airplane cabins, we can utilize ever-advancing state-of-the-art virtual and mixed reality technologies with the latest research in neuroscience and psychology to achieve high levels of comfort for passengers. Current surveys on passenger’s experience during air travel reveal that they are least satisfied with the amount and effectiveness of their personal space, and their ability to work, sleep or rest. Moreover, considering current trends it is likely that the amount of available space is likely to decrease and therefore the passenger’s physical comfort during a flight is likely to worsen significantly. Therefore, the main challenge is to enable the passengers to maintain a high level of comfort and satisfaction while being placed in a restricted physical space.

Keywords: virtual reality, future and emerging technology, comfort, perception, self-perception, avatars, social interaction

1 DEMONSTRATORS & DEMONSTRATIONS

The demonstrators will be virtual reality experts from nine European institutions. We will make sure that at least three-four of the authors are present at all time during the demonstrations. There will be two Oculus Rift setups of immersive project results, including a change in the perception of self [see e.g. 2], a change in the perception of space [see e.g. 1], as well as demonstrations of enhancing the interior cabin of the airplane [see Figure 1]. Additionally, there will be at least one video from each of the authors laboratories (see examples videos here http://www.vr-hyperspace.eu/gallery/images-vr) demonstrating various technical setups within this project. Videos specifically will focus on how up to six persons could share a virtual space all with their own perspectives [see 5 and 6 and Figure 2] and how this could change our future flight experience, how we are using a sophisticated motion simulator to investigate the influence of in-flight motions [see 3 and Figure 3], and finally entertainment and tele-robotic scenarios. This demonstration complements an expert panel titled, “Virtual Reality: Improving Passenger Comfort in Future Flights”, giving attendees more access to the many partners who are involved in this European Union FP7 funded project.

Figure 1: Physical Prototype: Fraunhofer IAO. Transparent Interior Airplane. 14 projectors and 8 displays convert the airplane walls and seats into virtual transparency (left image). For obtaining a realistic perspective view, the eyes of the passengers are tracked (right image).

2 PROJECT OBJECTIVES

The overall objective is to present a profoundly new approach to the issue of aircraft passengers’ comfort for the second half of this century. Recent results from cognitive neuroscience and virtual reality show that it is surprisingly easy to give people the illusion of substantial changes in their body with regard to appearance, posture, movement, and even structure. Additionally, virtualreality can be used to alter the surrounding visual space (or the way we perceive it) in a positive way. These illusions may be used to generate a sense of comfort in passengers, and to enable them to transform their sense of place to situations outside of the aircraft; to more desirable alternate realities, including situations from everyday life.

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IEEE Virtual Reality 201429 March - 2 April, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA978-1-4799-2871-2/14/$31.00 ©2014 IEEE

3 TECHNICAL APPROACH

This project brings together state-of-the-art research in neuroscience and psychology, especially self and space perception, as well as future visions of virtual and mixed reality technologies to create positive illusions that support passengers’ comfort. The VR-HYPERSPACE goal is that these positive illusions will enable passengers to feel that they are in an expanded or alternative space, looking well and feeling comfortable, carrying out activities with family, friends and colleagues.

Figure 3: Mixed-Mode Prototype: Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics & University of Barcelona: A virtual beach scene (creating a feeling of open space and an alternate relaxed body) can be experienced through a motiontracked head-mounted-display during simulated inflight motions. Additionally the experience of one’s body can be changed by the use of self-avatars.

Figure 4: A tele-operation system developed in cooperation by the Institute of Communication and Computer Systems, VTT and Thales-Alenia Space-Italy. The system is composed of arover/robotic arm user interaction device named ‘Ubiquitous Arm’ (UA), and the remote visual monitoring system. The goal is to develop natural methods to control the rover while being in a confined space thus enabling passengers to experience a physical presence both in the airplane and elsewhere.

4 RESULTS

In addition to scientific publications [1-6], VR-HYPERSPACE will provide a roadmap for the use of virtual and mixed reality technologies in conjunction with the latest advances in neuroscience and psychology to achieve a high level of comfort for passengers. For all public project reports see the website: http://www.vr-hyperspace.eu/ and/or contact the first author.

REFERENCES

[1] Linkenauger, Sally A.; Leyrer, Markus; Bülthoff, Heinrich H.; Mohler, Betty J. (2013): Welcome to Wonderland: the influence of the size and shape of a virtual hand on the perceived size and shape of virtual objects. In: PloS one 8 (7), S. e68594.

[2] Kilteni, Konstantina; Bergstrom, Ilias; Slater, Mel (2013): Drumming in immersive virtual reality: the body shapes the way we play. In: IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, 19 (4), S. 597–605.

[3] Piryankova, Ivelina V.; La Rosa, Stephan de; Kloos, Uwe; Bülthoff, Heinrich H.; Mohler, Betty J. (2013): Egocentric distance perception in large screen immersive displays. In: Elsevier Displays 34 (2), S. 153–164.

[4] Saulton Aurelie, Dodds, Trevor J., Tesch, Joachim, Mohler, Betty J. and Bülthoff, H. H. (2013) The influence of shape and culture on visual volume perception of virtual rooms. In Proceedings of the ACM Symposium on Applied Perception (SAP '13). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 142-142.

[5] Beck, Stephan; Kunert, André; Kulik, Alexander; Froehlich, Bernd (2013): Immersive Group-to-Group Telepresence: In: IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, 19(4):616-25.

[6] Kunert, André; Kulik, Alexander; Beck, Stephan; Froehlich, Bernd (2014): Photoportals: shared references in space and Time. In:Proceedings of the 2014 conference on Computer supported cooperative work (CSCW '14). ACM, New York, NY, USA.

Figure 2: Virtual Prototype: Bauhaus-Universität Weimar. Three passengers are seated in front of a large 3D screen showing the interior of a virtual airplane. The back of the seats can be turned into large multi-user 3D screens. The two passengers on the left are connected to friends on the ground via a live 3D video system.

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