Exploring the Design Space of Immersive Urban Analytics

TL;DR

This paper introduces a theoretical model and typology for immersive urban analytics visualizations, providing guidelines for view selection and discussing future research directions in the context of immersive head-mounted devices.

Contribution

It presents a novel theoretical model and a typology for combining 2D and 3D visualizations in immersive urban analytics, along with practical guidelines for view selection.

Findings

A comprehensive theoretical model for immersive urban analytics visualizations.

A typology distinguishing linked, embedded, and mixed views.

Guidelines for selecting appropriate visualization views based on spatial considerations.

Abstract

Recent years have witnessed the rapid development and wide adoption of immersive head-mounted devices, such as HTC VIVE, Oculus Rift, and Microsoft HoloLens. These immersive devices have the potential to significantly extend the methodology of urban visual analytics by providing critical 3D context information and creating a sense of presence. In this paper, we propose an theoretical model to characterize the visualizations in immersive urban analytics. Further more, based on our comprehensive and concise model, we contribute a typology of combination methods of 2D and 3D visualizations that distinguish between linked views, embedded views, and mixed views. We also propose a supporting guideline to assist users in selecting a proper view under certain circumstances by considering visual geometry and spatial distribution of the 2D and 3D visualizations. Finally, based on existing works, possible future research opportunities are explored and discussed.