User experiences with a virtual swimming interface exhibit

Abstract

We created an exhibit based on a new locomotion interface for swimming in a virtual reality ocean environment as part of our Swimming Across the Pacific ail project. In our exhibit we suspend the swimmer using a hand gliding and leg harness with pulleys and ropes in an 8ft-cubic swimming apparatus. The virtual reality ocean world has sky, sea waves, splashes, ocean floor and an avatar representing the swimmer who wears a tracked head-mounted display so he can watch himself swim. The audience sees the swimmer hanging in the apparatus overlaid on a video projection of his ocean swimming avatar. The avatar mimics the real swimmer's movements sensed by eight magnetic position trackers attached to the swimmer. Over 500 people tried swimming and thousands watched during two exhibitions. We report our observations of swimmers and audiences engaged in and enjoying the experience leading us to identify design strategies for interactive exhibitions. © IFIP International Federation for Information Processing 2005.