Work video meetings in the traditional grid interface have inclusion,effectiveness, and fatigue problems, due in part to the difficulty ofdirecting or communicating attention. Virtual 3D meeting spaceshave value, but representing people in them is a challenge. Avatarsface resistance, and 2D video is limited to near-frontal views, constraining the spatial layout. We present a novel experimental systemfor virtual meeting rooms that predicts 3D video of users in real-time from a standard webcam, positions them in a shared 3D space,and renders a controllable first-person view. We report study results comparing this system to a traditional grid, and to 2D videoof people in the same 3D space. While spatial layouts fared better in terms of attention and co-presence, the traditional grid wasmore comfortable and professional. This is likely due to unsettled3D design, the need for manual control, and a preference for thefamiliar.
@inproceedings{cashman2024an,
author = {Cashman, Tom and Hutton, Tim and Gorce, Martin de La and Takács, Tibor and Criminisi, Antonio and Ðorđević, Milica and Dubajić, Goran and Marjanović, Ðorđe and Okošanović, Milena and Ranković, Vukašin and Razumenić, Ivan and Roško, Bojan and Šarkić, Teo and Skakun, Marko and Stojanović, Miloš and Veličković, Nikola and Jovanović, Predrag and Panda, Payod and Tankelevitch, Lev and Rintel, Sean},
title = {An Equal Seat at the Table: Exploring Videoconferencing with Shared Spatial Context combined with 3D Video Representations},
booktitle = {CHI EA 2024},
year = {2024},
month = {May},
publisher = {ACM},
url = {https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/publication/an-equal-seat-at-the-table-exploring-videoconferencing-with-shared-spatial-context-combined-with-3d-video-representations/},
}