A Bowl-Shaped Display for Controlling Remote Vehicles

This paper proposes a bowl-shaped hemispherical display to observe omnidirectional images. This display type has many advantages over conventional, flat 2D displays, in particular when it is used for controlling remote vehicles. First, it allows users to observe an azimuthal equidistant view of omnidirectional images by looking from above. Second, it provides a first-person view by looking into the inside of the hemispherical surface from diagonally above. Third, it provides a pseudo–third-person view as if we watched the remote vehicle from its back, by observing both the inside and outside at the same time from obliquely above. These characteristics solve the issues of blind angles around the remote vehicle. We conduct a VR-based user study to compare the bowl-shaped display to an equirectangular projection on a 2D display and a first-person view used in head-mounted displays. Based on the insights gained in the study, we present a real-world implementation and describe the uniqueness, advantages but also shortcomings of our method.