Effects of joystick mapping and field-of-view on human performance in virtual walkthroughs

Virtual environments are increasingly used to visit virtual mockups of proposed buildings or virtualized models of real sites or buildings. This paper presents the results of a human-machine interaction experiment aimed at measuring the effects of the real field-of-view (FOV) and of the use of a third joystick axis on human performance for navigation in virtual walkthroughs in a closed-space environment. The results indicate that neither the real FOV nor the third joystick axis significantly affect performance. There is however a perceived increase of immersion with the larger real FOV, and an added freedom of movement when a third axis of movement is mapped onto the joystick.