Visual Fidelity Effects on Expressive Self-avatar in Virtual Reality: First Impressions Matter

Owning a virtual body inside Virtual Reality (VR) offers a unique experience where, typically, users are able to control their self- avatar’s body via tracked VR controllers. However, controlling a self-avatar’s facial movements is harder due to the HMD being in the way for tracking. In this work we present (1) the technical pipeline of creating and rigging self-alike avatars, whose facial expressions can be then controlled by users wearing the VIVE Pro Eye and VIVE Facial Tracker, and (2) based on this setting, two within-group studies on the psychological impact of the appearance realism of self- avatars, both the level of photorealism and self-likeness. Participants were told to practise their presentation, in front of a mirror, in the body of a realistic looking avatar and a cartoon like one, both animated with body and facial mocap data. In study 1 we made two bespoke self-alike avatars for each participant and we found that although participants found the cartoon-like character more attractive, they reported higher Body Ownership with whichever the avatar they had in the first trial. In study 2 we used generic avatars with higher fidelity facial animation, and found a similar “first trial effect” where they reported the avatar from their first trial being less creepy. Our results also suggested participants found the facial expressions easier to control with the cartoon-like character. Further, our eye-tracking data suggested that although participants were mainly facing their avatar during their presentation, their eye- gaze were focused elsewhere half of the time

Rereading the Narrative Paradox for Virtual Reality Theatre

We examined several key issues around audience autonomy in VR theatre. Informed by a literature review and a qualitative user study (grounded theory), we developed a conceptual model that enables a quantifiable evaluation of audience experience in VR theatre. A second user study inspired by the ‘narrative paradox’, investigates the relationship between spatial exploration and narrative comprehension in two VR performances. Our results show that although navigation distracted the participants from following the full story, they were more engaged, attached and had a better overall experience as a result of their freedom to move and interact

Male Bodily Responses during an Interaction with a Virtual Woman

This work presents the analysis of the body movement of male participants, while talking with a life-size virtual woman in a virtual social encounter within a CAVE-like system. We consider independent and explanatory variables including whether the participant is the centre of attention in the scenario, whether the participant is shy or confident, and his relationship status. We also examine whether this interaction between the participant and the virtual character changes as the conversation progresses. The results show that the participants tend to have different hand movements, head movements, and posture depending on these conditions. This research therefore provides strong evidence for using body movement as a systematic method to assess the responses of people within a virtual environment, especially when the participant interacts with a virtual character. These results also point the way towards the application of this technology to the treatment of social phobic mates

A Comparison of the Effects of Haptic and Visual Feedback on Presence in Virtual Reality

In the current consumer market, Virtual reality experiences are predominantly generated through visual and auditory feedback. Haptics are not yet well established, but are increasingly introduced to enhance the user’s sense of ‘reality’. With haptic (vibrotactile) feedback now part of the built-in mechanism of VR consumer devices, there is an urgent need to understand how different modalities work together to improve the user experience. This paper reports an experiment that explores the contributions made to participants’ sense of presence by haptic and visual feedback in a virtual environment. Participants experienced a virtual ball bouncing on a virtual stick resting across their avatar hands. We found that presence was enhanced when they could both see and feel the ball’s action; with a strong suggestion that haptic feedback alone gave rise to a greater sense of presence than visual alone. Similarly, whilst visual or bimodal feedback enhanced participants’ ability to locate where the ball bounced on the stick, our results suggest that the action itself was more readily discerned haptically than visually

A validation study to trigger nicotine craving in virtual reality

We built a virtual beer garden that contained various smoking cues (both verbal and non-verbal) using a motion capture system to record the realistic smoking behaviour related animations. Our 3-min long VR experience was optimized for Oculus Quest 2 with the hand tracking function enabled. We conducted a pilot study with 13 non-treatment-seeking nicotine-dependent cigarette smokers. The preliminary results indicate that this VR experience led to high levels of presence, and that there is a significant increase of nicotine craving - but only for those who reported a high level of immersion

Reducing Foreign Language Anxiety with Virtual Reality

An immersive VR experience was developed to examine the relationship between foreign language anxiety (FLA), virtual audience characteristics, and learners' perceptions of the virtual audience. Seven students studying English as a second language selected their avatars and practised their presentations in front of a virtual audience in a realistic classroom. Results indicated that participants' FLA levels increased when presenting to larger audiences, but decreased after repeated presentations. They were also able to identify the surroundings more readily when presenting in front of smaller audiences, as well as in front of audiences of diverse ethnicity

Prototyping Large Scale Projection Based Experiences in VR

The aim of this research was to develop a technique to simulate large scale, location-based installations in VR. The project is a col-laboration with Aardman Animations, a world-renowned animation studio developing a projection-based installation. We developed a room-scale VR experience to simulate the installation in order to visualise the projection distortion under different conditions. A study was then conducted using our simulation to investigate the effect of distortion of the projections on the experience of immersion and how three factors effected the distortion

Semi-Autonomous Avatars: A New Direction for Expressive User Embodiment

Computer animated characters are rapidly becoming a regular part of our lives. They are starting to take the place of actors in films and television and are now an integral part of most computer games. Perhaps most interestingly in on-line games and chat rooms they are representing the user visually in the form of avatars, becoming our on-line identities, our embodiments in a virtual world. Currently online environments such as “Second Life” are being taken up by people who would not traditionally have considered playing games before, largely due to a greater emphasis on social interaction. These environments require avatars that are more expressive and that can make on-line social interactions seem more like face-to-face conversations. Computer animated characters come in many different forms. Film characters require a substantial amount of off-line animator effort to achieve high levels of quality; these techniques are not suitable for real time applications and are not the focus of this chapter. Non-player characters (typically the bad guys) in games use limited artificial intelligence to react autonomously to events in real time. However avatars are completely controlled by their users, reacting to events solely through user commands. This chapter will discuss the distinction between fully autonomous characters and completely controlled avatars and how the current differentiation may no longer be useful, given that avatar technology may need to include more autonomy to live up to the demands of mass appeal. We will firstly discuss the two categories and present reasons to combine them. We will then describe previous work in this area and finally present our own framework for semi-autonomous avatars

Simulating Location-Based Experiences in VR

This research is a collaboration with Aardman Animations, a world-renowned animation studio to innovate their linear storytelling into a real-time, interactive and spatially immersive experience. We developed a room-scale VR experience to simulate the installation in order to visualise the projection distortion under different conditions. A study was then conducted using our simulation to investigate the effect of distortion of the projections on the experience of immersion and how three factors effected the distortion. This paper explains the preliminary results and the process

The Impact of Self-Representation and Consistency in Collaborative Virtual Environments

This paper explores the impact of self-representation (full body Self Avatar vs. Just Controllers) in a Collaborate Virtual Environment (CVE) and the consistency of self-representation between the users. We conducted two studies: Study 1 between a confederate and a participant, Study 2 between two participants. In both studies, participants were asked to play a collaborative game, and we investigated the effect on trust with a questionnaire, money invested in a trust game, and performance data. Study 1 suggested that having a Self Avatar made the participant give more positive marks to the confederate and that when the confederate was without an avatar, they received more trust (measured by money). Study 2 showed that consistency led to more trust and better productivity. Overall, results imply consistency improves trust only when in an equal social dynamic in CVE, and that the use of confederate could shift the social dynamics