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Benefits of immersive three-dimensional (3D) applications are enhanced by effective 3D interaction techniques. While gesture-based interaction provides benefits in these types of environments users commonly report higher fatigue than with other interaction solutions. Typically, fatigue is measured subjectively but may lack precision, consistency and depth. Our research proposes a novel, more consistent and predictable measure of fatigue. This paper presents the details of our technique based on human motor coordination, the results of an experimental study on gesture-based interaction, identifies attributing causes for fatigue and outlines design guidelines to reduce fatigue for gesture-based interaction techniques. These results have implications for gesture-based or mid-air interaction techniques for 3D environments, such as virtual environments and immersive visualizations.

In this paper, we present an investigation on the performance effects of analytical tools through visual and non-visual interaction in an immersive visualization. We explored two types of touch-based input device (with a display screen as direct and without a display screen as indirect), and compared these two touch-based input devices with a 6-degrees of freedom (DOF) tracked input device and a 2DOF input device, where a user could interact in 6DOF spatial context but the degrees of freedom were constrained. The results revealed that for visually demanding tasks, touch input is comparable to 6DOF, however it is important to use physical means to constrain degrees of freedom to retain performance levels using analytical tools involving selection. Furthermore results revealed that precision can be negatively affected by the design of the direct touch interface. Our results will have implications on touch-based interface design as well as design considerations when reducing degrees of freedom control.