Oct. 1, 2007 — Three-dimensional drawing programs offer precision, but still require input in two dimensions. Now scientists have developed a software program that trades the keyboard and mouse for virtual reality goggles with feedback to illustrate objects in mid-air.
The program, Drawing on Air, is meant to give scientists a better way to model complex ideas, and could eventually allow doctors to visualize a surgical procedure before they ever cut into a patient. It could also give artists an intuitive, simple way for moving from traditional freehand methods to computers.
"It's got 'drawing' in the title, but it's very three-dimensional, so in many ways it's more sculptural than it is drawing-based," said Daniel Keefe, post-doctoral research associate in computer science at Brown University in Providence, RI.
Keefe and his team describe the technology in the September/October issue of IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics.
To use the program, the sketcher sits in front of a conventional computer monitor and dons a pair of virtual reality goggles. Each lens is equipped with a shutter that opens and closes 100 times a second.
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When synched with the computer program, the right lens opens when the appropriate right-eye image is displayed on screen, and vice-versa for the left. The toggling back and forth between right and left eyes tricks the brain and creates an optical illusion that makes the image appear in three dimensions.
