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Virtual Notepad: immersive handwriting interfaces
Effective communication of textual data, such as taking
notes, adding annotations or comments is almost impossible in immersive VEs, since
participants are visually cut off from the real world and cannot easily access
conventional text input devices such as keyboards. Although speech recognition provides
some capability for text input, text manipulation and editing are difficult to accomplish
with voice alone, and current voice recognition technology suffers from poor performance
in noisy environments, limited sensitivity to differences in speaker voice and accent, and
other limitations (such as the need for silent interaction) in operational environments.
In the Virtual Notepad project, HITLab researchers hope to solve this problem by
investigating the use of handwriting as a source of input in immersive VR. Using a
spatially tracked pressure-sensitive graphics tablet from Wacom
Technology Corp. and a handwriting recognition engine from ParaGraph International, Inc. we are investigating
various approaches of incorporating handwriting as a mean of interacting in immersive VEs.
Sensory feedback is provided by registering a virtual tablet with the real one - so the
user can feel the tablet, and see the pen trajectory and the interpreted text stream. We
are currently exploring the utility of off-tablet display of the visual feedback for
various simulated tasks.
Immersive handwriting can be used in a variety of VR applications including
collaborative virtual environments, immersive design and 3D content creation, immersive
art and so on.
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