Immersive Virtual Environment for Visual Analytics
Modern virtual reality (VR) technology has garnered significant attention in the geographic visualization community for its ability to immerse users within spatial data. While immersion within one-to-one models of reality offers unique and powerful perspectives from which to view that data, VR also allows users to transcend the physical limitations of the real-world – exploring, experiencing, and interacting with spatial data at any scale, in any virtual environment, at any time. This research presents a collection of 3D data-driven case studies implemented in an immersive data visualization space.
THE PROJECT
The immersive virtual environment for visual analytics (IVEVA) showcases a multidisciplinary set of design heuristics that were utilized during the development process. These design heuristics, curated from cartography, human-computer interaction (HCI), and XR development played an integral role in the development of IVEVA as an extension to the space in which 3D GIScience and visual analytics are conducted. While XR interfaces have garnered attention for their ability to immerse users within one-to-one representations of reality, XR represents an opportunity to connect users with 3D spatial data in experiential, interactive, and analytical virtual environments. IVEVA presents five case studies, selected to highlight the challenges associated with different spatial phenomena and spatial data formats, and a collection of analytical tools for real-time data analysis and simulation.
Glass Sponge Morphology
This case study explores immersive morphometric analyses of 3D glass sponge point clouds as an alternative to current practices that rely on 2D displays, photographs (mosaics), and videos. Tools such as this could benefit marine ecologists as they assess and communicate the changes to complex marine ecosystems.
Human Movement in Built Environments
This case study presents VR as an authoring and visualization tool for human dynamics simulations – in this case, emergency egress and socially distanced movement in a built space. It was designed as a tool allowing emergency management and safety officers to simulate and explore human movement in built environments.
Urban Development
This case study was designed to showcase how city officials and community stakeholders could both visualize and explore proposed urban developments and the shadows that those developments would cast on the surrounding community.
Resource Management
The resource management visualization was designed to highlight the potential for immersive virtual environments as a visual analytics and communication tool for the analysis of GIS based spatial data layers. Immersive tools may help to reveal new information by providing new experiences and perspectives.
Flood Risk Governance
This case study discusses the design and development of an immersive virtual environment for city officials and community stakeholders to explore climate futures. This visualization combines topographic data, LiDAR point clouds, and climate change storm surge data for visual analyses of the potential impacts that flooding events could have on the environment and infrastructure.
Designing Virtual Spaces for Immersive Visual Analytics
Lochhead, I., & Hedley, N. (2021)
