An Investigation of Leap Motion Based 3D Manipulation Techniques for Use in Egocentric Viewpoint

In this paper we investigate suitable 3D manipulation techniques for a new generation of depth trackers exploitable in ego-vision for an immersive virtual environment. After presenting the specific configuration and hardware used, the paper focuses on an investigation into the advantages and disadvantages of the various techniques in order to choose the one most suitable for the manipulation of an object in an immersive virtual environment. We have faced the problem of canonical manipulation which includes, besides the selection, the positioning and rotation. Two different approaches are described allowing respectively a direct or constrained manipulation of the virtual object. Our aim is to evaluate the perceived usability of the two proposed manipulation techniques in the specific configuration and for this reason qualitative data have been gathered using the System Usability Scale questionnaire. The results show a different level of difficulty perceived by the testers between the two canonical manipulation techniques and a general preference for techniques that prove to be less tiring.