Visualizing future buildings : User-centered design process and evaluation of a sensor-based MAR prototype

Abstract: Mobile Augmented Reality (MAR) is an emerging technology that, when done right, can offer the users a rich experience. However, as with most emerging technologies, it is primarily technology-driven, often leaving the user needs aside. In this study a sensor-based MAR prototype was developed and evaluated, following a User-Centered Design process. The prototype visualized a future building in the city of Stockholm, Sweden. However, sensors in today’s smartphones are not perfect, which is a problem when used as tracking method to augment 3D-content. Also, developing a MAR experience includes some challenges and issues that need to be addressed in order to develop a good experience for the user. One of those challenges is to test and validate ideas at an early stage of the development. Usually when following a User-Centered Design process, prototyping is a useful tool for testing and validating. Though, even the simplest MAR experience requires an advanced infrastructure, which is expensive and time-consuming to develop. In this study both the inherited problems of smartphone sensors and the challenges regarding MAR development were taken into account during the development. To counteract these problems, cleverly designed functions were implemented. To evaluate the final version of the prototype, a user test was conducted in an urban environment. The most important lessons learned during this study were that today’s smartphones do not provide robust and accurate sensor data in an urban environment. Resulting in incorrect placement and flickering of the augmented 3D-object. Also, the functions that were developed to counteract these problems helped in some degree, indicating the potential of overcoming hardware problems with cleverly designed functions. Last, using existing AR framework to produce an interactive and AR-enabled prototype, to a low cost and relatively fast, proved successful.