Merging the Worlds of Atoms and Bits : Augmented Virtual Environments

Interactive 3D visualization has found myriad applications in flight simulation, scientific visualization, training and education. This article reviews recent advancements in creating interactive augmented virtual environments that integrate digital information into the fabric of the physical world and enhance our sensory perceptions. physician is evaluating a patient lying on an exam table. To aid in her diagnosis, the doctor superimposes a 3D image of the patient's stomach and intestines in life-sized scale onto his ventral side. The doctor, wearing a goggle-like 3D display, may view the A dataset from different perspectives by changing her own viewpoint, or may instruct the patient to move his body to gain a better perspective. If the physician wishes to analyze a feature of the patient's internal physiology in more detail, she can grab and magnify the 3D image of this feature for viewing through an immersive room display, and even " fly " into the specified region by walking about the room. The medical images and other related digital information become an integrative part of the physical environment, and the doctor is able to freely navigate through the merged worlds of atoms and bits. A proof-of-concept demonstration for medical visualization. to characterize various visual displays. As illustrated in the figure above, the " real " world and entirely computer-generated virtual environments represent opposite poles of the spectrum. Excluding the poles, the segment toward the center is known as mixed reality. The left portion of the mixed reality segment represents augmented reality, where digital information is overlaid on a real-world scene, and the right is referred to as augmented virtuality, in which a virtual environment is selectively enhanced with real-world data. The major difference between mixed and virtual reality is that the former uses the physical world as its reference and scale to render virtual information correlated with its real counterpart, while the latter may have an arbitrary reference point and scale without correlation with the physical surroundings. Thus, a mixed reality system requires that the overlaid virtual information be aligned with the user's real-world senses—a process known as registration. This classical view of the RV continuum emphasizes the visual aspect of the transition between the physical and digital worlds. For instance, one of the very first visions for mixed reality interfaces is aimed at data visualization, where the goal is to correctly register virtual information relative to the real-world objects so that the viewer …