Reorienting with the Bare Hand: Gesture-Based Techniques for Orientation-Enabled Teleportation in Virtual Reality

Area of Science:

• Virtual Reality (VR)
• Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)
• Locomotion Techniques

Background:

• Teleportation is a common VR locomotion method, often including reorientation.
• Current reorientation techniques can increase interaction time, complexity, and mental workload.
• Bare-hand interaction is increasingly supported in mainstream VR systems.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate reorientation-enabled teleportation using bare-hand gestures.
• To introduce and evaluate novel gesture-based reorientation techniques.
• To provide design guidance for intuitive VR navigation.

Main Methods:

• Four gesture-based techniques were developed: Concurrent Wrist Rotation (C-WR), Decoupled Wrist Rotation (D-WR), Joystick Wrist Rotation (J-WR), and Direction Drawing (DD).
• A controlled user study with 24 participants evaluated these techniques.
• Performance metrics included interaction time, accuracy, and user preference.

Main Results:

• C-WR was the fastest but most error-prone.
• D-WR improved accuracy but was slower.
• J-WR allowed precise control but was demanding and slow.
• DD demonstrated balanced performance and was the most preferred technique.

Conclusions:

• Gesture-based reorientation in VR offers diverse trade-offs between speed, accuracy, and usability.
• Direction Drawing (DD) provides a promising approach for efficient and intuitive VR navigation.
• Design implications emphasize intuitive mappings and support for user preferences in VR locomotion.