International audienceIn recent years Augmented Reality (AR) has become more and more popular, especially since the availability of mobile devices, such as smartphones or tablets, brought AR into our everyday life. Although the AR community has not yet agreed on a formal definition of AR, some work focused on proposing classifications of existing AR methods or applications. Such applications cover a wide variety of technologies, devices and goals, consequently existing taxonomies rely on multiple classification criteria that try to take into account AR applications diversity. In this paper we review existing taxonomies of augmented reality applications and we propose our own, which is based on (1) the number of degrees of freedom required by the tracking of the application, as well as on (2) the visualization mode used, (3) the temporal base of the displayed content and (4) the rendering modalities used in the application. Our taxonomy covers location-based services as well as more traditional vision-based AR applications. Although AR is mainly based on the visual sense, other rendering modalities are also covered by the same degree-of-freedom criterion in our classification

As stereoscopic devices become widely used (immersion-based working environments, stereoscopically viewed movies, autostereoscopic screens, etc), exposure to stereoscopic images can become lengthy, and some eyestrain can set in. We propose a method for reducing eyestrain induced by stereoscopic vision. After reviewing sources of eyestrain linked to stereoscopic vision, we will focus on one of these sources: images with high-frequency contents associated with large disparities. We will put forward an algorithm for removing irritating high frequencies in high disparity zones (i.e., for virtual objects appearing far from the real screen level). We will elaborate on our testing protocol to establish that our processing reduces eyestrain caused by stereoscopic vision, both objectively and subjectively. We will subsequently quantify the positive effects of our algorithm on the relief of eyestrain. As our processing alters the visual quality of the virtual world, we propose a new adaptation of our method to remove this drawback by coupling an eye tracking to our original processing to keep visual quality on the focus point.

Stereoscopic devices are widely used (immersion-based working environments, stereoscopically-viewed movies, auto-stereoscopic screens). In some instances, exposure to stereoscopic immersion techniques can be lengthy, and so eye strain sets in. We propose a method for reducing eye strain induced by stereoscopic vision. After reviewing sources of eye strain linked to stereoscopic vision, we focus on one of these sources: images with high frequency content associated with large disparities. We put forward an algorithm for removing the irritating high frequencies in high horizontal disparity zones (i.e., for virtual objects appearing far from the real screen level). We elaborate on our testing protocol to establish that our image processing method reduces eye strain caused by stereoscopic vision, both objectively and subjectively. We subsequently quantify the positive effects of our algorithm on the relief of eye strain and discuss further research perspectives.

Virtual reality shows to be of use in several domains of manufacturing as a complementary tool to CAD/CAM environment. Design review is one of the very first application of VR in product design, but assembly/disassembly studies are also existing though they require some more specific work. But it can also be useful beyond the scope of common CAD software such as ergonomic studies. We will show an example from the RNTL PERF-RV project where we study the ergonomics of a car dashboard and more specifically of a push-button. We will discuss the issues raised by studying ergonomics thanks to Virtual Reality and force-feedback systems which are both hardware and software. La réalité virtuelle a montré son utilité dans plusieurs domaines de l'industrie manufacturière en tant que complément aux environnements de CAO/FAO. La revue de projet est la toute première application de réalité virtuelle en conception de produit. Il existe aussi des applications de montage/démontage même si celles-ci requièrent des travaux plus spécifiques. De nouvelles applications émergent au-delà de la sphère traditionnelle des logiciels de CAO comme dans le domaine des études d'ergonomie. Nous montrerons un exemple du projet PERF-RV du RNTL où nous étudions l'ergonomie d'une planche de bord automobile et en particulier celle d'un bouton poussoir. Nous discuterons les questions soulevées par les études d'ergonomie utilisant les techniques de réalité virtuelle et de retour d'effort qui relèvent à la fois du matériel et du logiciel.