Interactive 3D Visualization of a Large University Campus over the Web

Nowadays, with the rise and generalized use of web applications and graphical hardware evolution, one of the most interesting problems deals with realistic real-time visualization of virtual environments on web browsers. This paper shows an on-line application to dynamically visualize a large campus on the World Wide Web. The application focuses on a smooth walk through a large 3D environment in real-time as an alternative way to index geographically related information. This way, contents are continuously filtered based on viewpoint¿s position. This can be made thanks to the availability of different models corresponding to different levels of detail (LOD) for each modeled building. A server storage model has been purposed including all models, compound of meshes, textures and information. The technique is based on an algorithm that performs a progressive refining of the models, according to the distance from the viewpoint.Vendrell Vidal, E.; Sanchez Belenguer, C. (2011). Interactive 3D Visualization of a Large University Campus over the Web. International Journal of Computer Information Systems and Industrial Management Applications. 3:514-521. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/35020S514521

A 3D e-Commerce Applications Development Model: A Systematic Literature Review

Due to limitations of current e-commerce websites and today’s highly competitive e-commerce environment, businesses using Virtual Reality technologies to improve customers' interactivity, by providing shopping experiences with their products and services similar to the real-life shopping, are better recognized. In this paper, the key aspects of 3D e-commerce research areas are investigated by using a systematic literature review approach. In the review, research areas such as design, trust, marketing, Augmented Reality and product presentation, business practices, interface quality, shopping experience and behavior as well as consumer learning along with other related issues are identified and discussed. A conceptual model is then proposed to highlight and provide insights for future research on how to develop a business model in 3D e-commerce environments

A Survey of Interaction Techniques for Interactive 3D Environments

International audienceVarious interaction techniques have been developed for interactive 3D environments. This paper presents an up-to-date and comprehensive review of the state of the art of non-immersive interaction techniques for Navigation, Selection & Manipulation, and System Control, including a basic introduction to the topic, the challenges, and an examination of a number of popular approaches. We hope that this survey can aid both researchers and developers of interactive 3D applications in having a clearer overview of the topic and in particular can be useful for practitioners and researchers that are new to the field of interactive 3D graphics

Enhancing the use of online 3d multimedia content through the analysis of user interactions

De plus en plus de contenus 3D interactifs sont disponibles sur la toile. Visualiser et manipuler ces contenus 3D en temps réel, de façon naturelle et intuitive, devient donc une nécessité. Les applications visées sont nombreuses : le e-commerce, l'éducation et la formation en ligne, la conception, ou l'architecture dans le contexte par exemple de musées virtuels ou de communautés virtuelles. L'utilisation de contenus 3D en ligne ne propose pas de remplacer les contenus traditionnels, tels que les textes, les images ou les vidéos, mais plutôt d'utiliser la 3D en complément, pour enrichir ces contenus. La toile est désormais une plate-forme où les contenus hypertexte, hypermédia, et 3D sont simultanément disponibles pour les utilisateurs. Cette utilisation des contenus 3D pose cependant deux questions principales. Tout d'abord, les interactions 3D sont souvent lourdes puisqu'elles comprennent de nombreux degrés de liberté; la navigation dans les contenus 3D peut s'en trouver inefficace et lente. Nous abordons ce problème en proposant un nouveau paradigme basé sur l'analyse des interactions (crowdsourcing). En analysant les interactions d'utilisateurs 3D, nous identifions des régions d'intérêt (ROI), et générons des recommandations pour les utilisateurs suivants. Ces recommandations permettent à la fois de réduire le temps d'interaction pour identifier une ROI d'un objet 3D et également de simplifier les interactions 3D nécessaires. De plus, les scènes ou objets 3D contiennent une information visuelle riche. Les sites Web traditionnels contiennent, eux, principalement des informations descriptives (textuelles) ainsi que des hyperliens pour permettre la navigation. Des sites contenants d'une part de l'information textuelle, et d'autre part de l'information 3D peuvent s'avérer difficile à appréhender pour les utilisateurs. Pour permettre une navigation cohérente entre les informations 3D et textuelles, nous proposons d'utiliser le crowdsourcing pour la construction d'associations sémantiques entre le texte et la visualisation en 3D. Les liens produits sont proposés aux utilisateurs suivants pour naviguer facilement vers un point de vue d'un objet 3D associé à un contenu textuel. Nous évaluons ces deux méthodes par des études expérimentales. Les évaluations montrent que les recommandations réduisent le temps d'interaction 3D. En outre, les utilisateurs apprécient l'association sémantique proposée, c'est-à-dire, une majorité d'utilisateurs indique que les recommandations ont été utiles pour eux, et préfèrent la navigation en 3D proposée qui consiste à utiliser les liens sémantiques ainsi que la souris par rapport à des interactions utilisant seulement la souris. ABSTRACT : Recent years have seen the development of interactive 3D graphics on the Web. The ability to visualize and manipulate 3D content in real time seems to be the next evolution of the Web for a wide number of application areas such as e-commerce, education and training, architecture design, virtual museums and virtual communities. The use of online 3D graphics in these application domains does not mean to substitute traditional web content of texts, images and videos, but rather acts as a complement for it. The Web is now a platform where hypertext, hypermedia, and 3D graphics are simultaneously available to users. This use of online 3D graphics, however, poses two main issues. First, since 3D interactions are cumbersome as they provide numerous degrees of freedom, 3D browsing may be inefficient. We tackle this problem by proposing a new paradigm based on crowdsourcing to ease online 3D interactions, that consists of analyzing 3D user interactions to identify Regions of Interest (ROIs), and generating recommendations to subsequent users. The recommendations both reduce 3D browsing time and simplify 3D interactions. Second, 3D graphics contain purely rich visual information of the concepts. On the other hand, traditional websites mainly contain descriptive information (text) with hyperlinks as navigation means. The problem is that viewing and interacting with the websites that use two very different mediums (hypertext and 3D graphics) may be complicated for users. To address this issue, we propose to use crowdsourcing for building semantic associations between texts and 3D visualizations. The produced links are suggested to upcoming users so that they can readily locate 3D visualization associated with a textual content. We evaluate the proposed methods with experimental user studies. The evaluations show that the recommendations reduce 3D interaction time. Moreover, the results from the user study showed that our proposed semantic association is appreciated by users, that is, a majority of users assess that recommendations were helpful for them, and browsing 3D objects using both mouse interactions and the proposed links is preferred compared to having only mouse interactions

Une assistance à l'interaction 3D en réalité virutuelle par un raisonnement sémantique et une conscience du contexte

Les tâches dans les environnements virtuels immersifs sont associées à des techniques et à des dispositifs d interaction 3D (e.g. la sélection d objets 3D à l aide de la main virtuelle via un flystick). Alors que les environnements et les tâches deviennent de plus en plus complexes, les techniques ne peuvent plus être les mêmes pour chaque application, voire pour les différentes situations au sein d une application. Une solution est d adapter l interaction en fonction des besoins de la situation pour améliorer l utilisabilité. Ces adaptations peuvent être effectuées manuellement par le concepteur ou l utilisateur, ou automatiquement par le système créant ainsi une interaction adaptative. La formalisation d une telle assistance automatique nécessite la gestion d informations pertinentes au vu de la situation. L ensemble de ces informations fait émerger le contexte de l interaction. L assistance adaptative obtenue en raisonnant à partir de ces informations est ainsi consciente du contexte. De nombreuses possibilités existent pour l obtenir. Notre objectif est une gestion du contexte qui préserve ses degrés élevés d expressivité et d évolutivité tout en étant facile à intégrer. Nous proposons une modélisation de ce problème par des graphes conceptuels basés sur une ontologie et gérés par un moteur externe en logique du premier ordre. Le moteur est générique et utilise une base de connaissance contenant des faits et des règles, qui peuvent être changés dynamiquement. Nous avons intégré une notion de confiance, afin d établir l adéquation d une situation à la base de connaissances. La confiance des réactions est comparée à leur impact afin de ne garder que les pertinentes tout en évitant de saturer l utilisateur. Les applications utilisent des outils qui peuvent être contrôlés par le moteur. Des capteurs permettent d extraire des informations sémantiques pour le contexte. Des effecteurs permettent d agir sur l application et d obtenir des adaptations. Un jeu d outils et une base de connaissance pour l interaction 3D ont été créés. De nombreuses étapes sont introduites dans la base de connaissance pour de bonnes combinaisons et une réflexion indépendante d outils spécifiques. Nos premières applications illustrent la compréhension de la situation, dont les intérêts et difficultés de l utilisateur, et le déclenchement d assistances adaptées. Une étude hors ligne montre ensuite l accès et l évolution des étapes du moteur selon la situation. Le raisonnement sémantique générique obtenu est alors expressif, compréhensif, extensif et modifiable dynamiquement. Pour l interaction 3D, il permet une assistance universelle automatique, ponctuelle ou manuelle à l utilisateur et des analyses hors-lignes d activités ou de conceptions pour le concepteur.Tasks in immersive virtual environments are associated with 3D interaction techniques and devices (e.g. the selection of 3D objects with the virtual hand and a flystick). As environments and tasks become more and more complex, techniques can not remain the same for each application, even for every situations of a single application. A solution is to adapt the interaction depending on the situation in order to increase usability. These adaptations can be done manually by the designer or the user, or automatically by the system thus creating an adaptative interaction. Formalisation of such assistance needs the management of pertinent information regarding the situation. Those items of information make the context emerge from the interaction. The adaptative assistance obtained by reasoning on this information is then context-aware. Numerous possibilities can be used to build one. Our objective is a context management that preserves its high degrees of expressiveness and evolutivity while being easy to plug in. We have built a model for this issue using conceptual graphs based on an ontology and managed externally with a first order logic engine. The engine is generic and uses a knowledge base with facts and rules which can be dynamically changed. We have added a confidence notion, in order to establish a situation similarity to the knowledge base. Reactions confidences are compared to their impacts so as to keep only the pertinent ones while avoiding user overload. Applications have tools that can be controlled by the engine. Sensors are used to extract semantic information for the context. Effectors are used to act upon the application and to have adaptations. A tools set and a knowledge base have been created for 3D interaction. Numerous steps have been added in the knowledge base to obtain good combinations and a reasoning independent from specific tools. Our first applications shows the situation understanding, including user interests and difficulties, and the triggering of pertinent assistances. An off-line study illustrates the access and evolution of the internal engine steps. The built generic semantic reasoning is expressive, understandable, extensive and modifiable dynamically. For 3D interaction, it allows universal assistances for the user that can be automatic, punctual or manual and off-line activities or conceptions analysis fort he designers.EVRY-Bib. électronique (912289901) / SudocSudocFranceF

Adaptive 3D Web Sites

Abstract. In recent years, technological developments have made it possible to build interactive 3D models of objects and 3D Virtual Environments that can be experienced through the Web, using common, low-cost personal computers. As in the case of Web-based hypermedia, adaptivity can play an important role in increasing the usefulness, effectiveness and usability of 3D Web sites, i.e., Web sites distributing 3D content. This paper introduces the reader to the concepts, issues and techniques of adaptive 3D Web sites. In recent years, technological developments have made it possible to build interactive 3D models of objects and 3D Virtual Environments (hereinafter, 3D VEs) that can be experienced through the Web, using common, low-cost personal computers. As a result, 3D content is increasingly employed in different Web application areas, suc

Dynamic Generation of Personalized VRML Content: a General Approach and its Application to 3D E-Commerce

The capability of (semi)automatically adapting the content, structure, and/or presentation of a Web site to address the interests and preferences of each individual user is more and more considered as a key factor to increase user satisfaction and building customer loyalty. However, while a large body of literature is available about making traditional Web sites adaptive, it is surprising that no research effort has been yet devoted to the problem of adapting Web3D content and presentation. This paper focuses on this topic, proposing a general approach to build adaptive 3D Web sites, and illustrating a specific application of the approach to a 3D e-commerce case study. The architecture we propose, called AWE3D (Adaptive WEb 3D), is based on a combination of readily available and platform-independent Web technologies so that it can be reproduced by interested readers