Virtual Locomotion System for Large-Scale Virtual Environment

Omni-directional locomotion systems are yet of little advantage in virtual environments (VEs) with limited large display system, where users may experience visualless situations when they move in a direction that is not covered by the large screen. This paper presents a new omni-directional locomotion interface based on step-inplace movement and a smart-turntable system to impart users with the ability to move freely in any direction within VEs without loosing sight of the displayed image despite its projection on a limited large screen that do not provide surrounding or 360o visual feedback. The novelty of the interface is that a) it uses a smart-turntable with embedded sensors as walking platform that compensate users’ rotations rather than their displacements b) no cable attachments are made to the user body c) user can make many full body rotations without loosing sight of the environment, virtually providing a surrounding display despite the use of limited size screen.