While human fingertips are capable of very delicate movements, the resolution of our vision has its limits, requiring tools such as magnifying glasses for fine manual tasks. In computer screen work, it is common to support fine tasks by magnifying the work area. However, this approach has problems: it becomes difficult to grasp the overall view, and distortion occurs between the magnified area and the normal field of view.
To address this, we propose a method that, instead of magnifying the target object, displays an amplified version of hand movements in the peripheral area of the screen (peripheral visual field). Since peripheral vision excels at detecting motion despite having lower spatial resolution, this approach is expected to make subtle movements more perceptible and effectively support fine manual tasks.
In our experiments using an LCD pen tablet, we displayed noise patterns synchronized with fingertip movements in the peripheral area of the screen and examined their effects on participants’ operations. While little effect was observed during stylus operation or when the mouse cursor was visible, clear effects were confirmed when the mouse cursor was hidden. In particular, we found that motion presentation in peripheral vision contributed to improved operational accuracy when drawing horizontal or vertical lines.
This method has potential applications in improving the precision of tasks requiring fingertip movements too subtle to be visually confirmed, such as soldering or precision drawing work.
Award
- Student Encouragement Award, 152nd HCI Research Meeting