Comparison of techniques for mixed-space collaborative navigation

This paper describes the results of two studies conducted to determine the role of visual cues for a collaborative navigation task in a mixed-space environment. Both studies required a user with an exocentric view of a virtual room to navigate a fully immersed user with an egocentric view to an exit. The first study compares natural hand-based gestures, a mouse-based interface and an audio-only technique to determine their relative efficiency on task completion times. The follow-up study compares natural handbased gestures against a mouse-based interface in a scenario in which participants are unable to communicate verbally. The results show that visual cue-based collaborative navigation techniques are significantly more efficient than an audio-only technique. The results also show that natural hand gestures are more expressive and lead to quicker completion times in situations where verbal communication is not possible.