Performance Evaluation of 3D Light Field Display Based on Mental Rotation Tasks

Three-dimensional light field display, which can provide human with natural 3D images in the way of humans observing the real world without any glasses, has attracted more and more attentions in recent years. However, most of studies focus on the performance improvement of 3D light field display, and there is rarely work on the performance evaluation of 3D light field display. In this paper, a quantitative performance evaluation method of the 3D light field display based on cognitive measurement of the observer with a specifically designed mental rotation task is proposed. The procedure of the performance evaluation experiment design is demonstrated, some pairs of complex images with either same structure or mirror structure are displayed, and the participants are required to distinguish whether the displayed images are the same. Three different control experiments including 2D display with fixed viewpoint, 3D light field display with fixed viewpoint and 3D light field display with a free view are designed. 45 participants which are divided into three groups are assigned to take part in three difference control experiments, and the rate of mission success and the completion time are evaluated. By comparing the results on different experimental conditions and using a statistic analysis method called T-test, the superiority of 3D light field display is proved quantitatively.