Scope Meets Screen: Lessons Learned in Designing Composite Visualizations for Marksmanship Training Across Skill Levels

TL;DR

This paper introduces a composite visualization system combining first-person shooting videos with analytical overlays, enhancing coaching effectiveness across skill levels in marksmanship training.

Contribution

It presents a novel visualization approach integrating video and analytics for marksmanship training, evaluated through a mixed-methods user study.

Findings

Dashboard-style view was preferred in 9 of 10 cases.

Composite visualization supported understanding across skill levels.

Insights suggest broader applications in precision sports coaching.

Abstract

Marksmanship practices are required in various professions, including police, military personnel, hunters, as well as sports shooters, such as Olympic shooting, biathlon, and modern pentathlon. The current form of training and coaching is mostly based on repetition, where the coach does not see through the eyes of the shooter, and analysis is limited to stance and accuracy post-session. In this study, we present a shooting visualization system and evaluate its perceived effectiveness for both novice and expert shooters. To achieve this, five composite visualizations were developed using first-person shooting video recordings enriched with overlaid metrics and graphical summaries. These views were evaluated with 10 participants (5 expert marksmen, 5 novices) through a mixed-methods study including shot-count and aiming interpretation tasks, pairwise preference comparisons, and semi-structured interviews. The results show that a dashboard-style composite view, combining raw video with a polar plot and selected graphs, was preferred in 9 of 10 cases and supported understanding across skill levels. The insights gained from this design study point to the broader value of integrating first-person video with visual analytics for coaching, and we suggest directions for applying this approach to other precision-based sports.