J. Edward Swan II

The Effects of Text Drawing Styles, Background Textures, and Natural Lighting on Text Legibility in Outdoor Augmented Reality

Joseph L. Gabbard, J. Edward Swan II, and Deborah Hix. The Effects of Text Drawing Styles, Background Textures, and Natural Lighting on Text Legibility in Outdoor Augmented Reality. PRESENCE: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, 15(1):16–32, February 2006.

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Abstract

A challenge in presenting augmenting information in outdoor augmented reality (AR) settings lies in the broad range of uncontrollable environmental conditions that may be present, specifically large-scale fluctuations in natural lighting and wide variations in likely backgrounds or objects in the scene. In this paper, we motivate the need for research on the effects of text drawing styles, outdoor background textures, and natural lighting on user performance in outdoor AR. We present a pilot study and a follow-on user-based study that examined the effects on user performance of outdoor background textures, changing outdoor illuminance values, and text drawing styles in a text identification task using an optical, see-through AR system. We report significant effects for all these variables, and discuss user interface design guidelines and ideas for future work.

BibTeX

@Article{PRESENCE06-tlar, 
  author =       {Joseph L. Gabbard and J. Edward {Swan~II} and Deborah Hix}, 
  title =        {The Effects of Text Drawing Styles, Background Textures, and Natural 
                  Lighting on Text Legibility in Outdoor Augmented Reality}, 
  journal =      {PRESENCE: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments}, 
  month =        {February}, 
  volume =       15, 
  number =       1, 
  year =         2006, 
  pages =        {16--32}, 
  abstract =     { 
A challenge in presenting augmenting information in outdoor augmented reality 
(AR) settings lies in the broad range of uncontrollable environmental conditions 
that may be present, specifically large-scale fluctuations in natural lighting 
and wide variations in likely backgrounds or objects in the scene.  In this 
paper, we motivate the need for research on the effects of text drawing styles, 
outdoor background textures, and natural lighting on user performance in outdoor 
AR.  We present a pilot study and a follow-on user-based study that examined the 
effects on user performance of outdoor background textures, changing outdoor 
illuminance values, and text drawing styles in a text identification task using 
an optical, see-through AR system.  We report significant effects for all these 
variables, and discuss user interface design guidelines and ideas for future 
work. 
}, 
}