Recently a collaborative paper
between De Montfort University, Coventry University and Masaryk University (HCI
Lab) was published at the journal of Entertainment Computing, sponsored by Elsevier.
The paper is entitled “Assessing the perceived realism of agent grouping
dynamics for adaptation and simulation” and is focused on applications
targeting human interaction. The paper presents a novel method using
psychophysics to assess the perceived realism of behavioural features with
respect to virtual crowds.
Focus is given to the grouping
dynamics feature, whereby crowd composition in terms of group frequency and
density is evaluated through thirty-six conditions based on crowd data captured
from three pedestrianised real-world locations. The study, conducted with
seventy-eight healthy participants, allowed for the calculation of perceptual
thresholds, with configurations identified that appear most real to human
viewers. Results suggest that viewers have more perceptual flexibility when
group frequency and density are increased, rather than decreased.
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