Spring Stepper: A Makerspace Controller for Seated Hands-Free Locomotion in Virtual Reality by Christopher Carmichael A thesis submitted to the School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Computer Science Faculty of Science Ontario Tech University Oshawa, Ontario, Canada December 2019 Copyright c Christopher Carmichael, 2019 THESIS EXAMINATION INFORMATION Submitted by: Christopher Carmichael Masters of Science in Computer Science Thesis title: Spring Stepper: A Makerspace Controller for Seated Hands-Free Locomotion in Virtual Reality An oral defense of this thesis took place on November 26, 2019 in front of the following examining committee: Examining Committee: Chair of Examining Committee Dr. Faisal Qureshi Research Supervisor Dr. Alvaro Uribe Quevedo Examining Committee Member Dr. Bill Kapralos Thesis Examiner Dr. Richard W. Pazzi, Ontario Tech University The above committee determined that the thesis is acceptable in form and content and that a satisfactory knowledge of the field covered by the thesis was demonstrated by the candidate during an oral examination. A signed copy of the Certificate of Approval is available from the School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies. i Abstract Natural locomotion is crucial for improving presence in a virtual environment (VE), while also reducing simulator sickness. While research in various areas of virtual reality (VR), such as head-mounted displays (HMD) and optical tracking, has been advancing at an unprecedented rate, there is currently a lack of suitable hands-free lo- comotion devices for VR, with most existing locomotion solutions involving complex, high-cost systems. This thesis presents the Spring Stepper, a hands-free, consumer- level seated VR locomotion controller. The presented system is created with open- source readily available development tools, commonly known as "makerspace" tools, such as 3D printing and Arduino, an open electronics platform. The full design and development process of the system is discussed, including analyzing existing litera- ture to gather requirements, and the iterative design process to create the prototype. Finally, the prototype was validated through user testing by comparing it to exist- ing consumer-level seated VR locomotion devices for speed, ability to allow accurate hand interactions, and usability. Keywords: virtual reality; locomotion; makerspace ii Author's Declaration I hereby declare that this thesis consists of original work of which I have authored. This is a true copy of the thesis, including any required final revisions, as accepted by my examiners. I authorize the University of Ontario Institute of Technology to lend this thesis to other institutions or individuals for the purpose of scholarly research. I further authorize University of Ontario Institute of Technology to reproduce this thesis by photocopying or by other means, in total or in part, at the request of other institutions or individuals for the purpose of scholarly research. I understand that my thesis will be made electronically available to the public. The research work in this thesis that was performed in compliance with the reg- ulations of Ontario Tech's Research Ethics Board under REB Certificate 15314. Christopher Carmichael iii Statement of Contributions Part of the work described in Chapter 3 has been published as: M. Valdez Balderas, C. Carmichael, B. Ko, A. Nova, A. Tabafunda, and A. Uribe- Quevedo, \A Makerspace Foot Pedal and Shoe Add-On for Seated Virtual Reality Locomotion," in 2019 IEEE 9th International Conference on Consumer Electronics (ICCE-Berlin), 2019. I worked on the design of the shoe add-on, designed and developed the experiment and the test simulation, and wrote part of the manuscript for the above paper. I hereby certify that I am the sole author of the rest of the content of this thesis. I have used standard referencing practices to acknowledge ideas, research techniques, or other materials that belong to others. iv Acknowledgements First, I would like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Alvaro Uribe Quevedo, for giving me the opportunity to pursue this research, and for his invaluable insight and guidance throughout the course of this degree. It was always a pleasure to have our meetings, which seemed to always end in conversations about games, anime, or cool new tech. I would also like to thank Angela Tabafunda, Bill Ko, and Atiya Nova for their help during the Games Hardware / User Interface Technology course group project. Without you three, the Home Hiker would not exist. Thanks to all my friends in the GAMER Lab, you guys made this degree so much more fun. Thanks also to all my friends outside the lab, you made sure I still had a social life outside of my research. Special thanks to Zac Hills, Mike Chan, David Arppe, Claire Salati, and Matt Rabski for being such awesome friends, I know I've come to all of you many times for support and you were always there for me. I definitely wouldn't have been able to finish this degree without you guys. Finally, I would like to thank my family, especially my parents, Mary and James Carmichael. You guys have supported me through my awful life choices, and I know it couldn't have been easy. You always encouraged me to finish what I started, and I definitely wouldn't have gotten this far without you. v Contents Abstract ii Author's Declaration iii Statement of Contributions iv Acknowledgementsv Contents vi List of Figures ix List of Tables xi Abbreviations xii 1 Introduction1 1.1 Context .................................. 1 1.2 Problem Statement............................ 4 1.3 Justification................................ 4 1.4 Research Questions............................ 4 1.5 Objective ................................. 5 1.6 Methodology ............................... 5 1.7 Document Structure ........................... 6 2 Related Works8 2.1 Single-Directional Treadmills....................... 8 2.2 Omni-Directional Treadmills....................... 10 2.3 Walking in Place ............................. 12 2.4 Sliding-Based Surfaces .......................... 15 2.5 Stepping Systems............................. 17 2.6 Miscellaneous............................... 19 2.6.1 Spherical Systems......................... 20 2.6.2 Robotic Tiles ........................... 20 vi 2.6.3 Redirected Walking........................ 21 2.6.4 Hand-Based Techniques ..................... 21 2.6.5 Locomotion Techniques for Seated VR ............. 22 2.7 Summary ................................. 23 3 Development 25 3.1 Plank Device ............................... 26 3.1.1 Hardware ............................. 26 3.1.2 Software.............................. 27 3.1.3 Analysis & Conclusion...................... 28 3.2 Seat Controller .............................. 29 3.2.1 Hardware ............................. 29 3.2.2 Software.............................. 31 3.2.3 Analysis & Conclusion...................... 32 3.3 Home Hiker................................ 33 3.3.1 Hardware ............................. 35 3.3.2 Software.............................. 35 3.3.3 Preliminary Study ........................ 36 3.3.4 Conclusion............................. 39 3.4 Spring Stepper .............................. 39 3.4.1 Hardware ............................. 41 3.4.2 Software.............................. 41 4 Experiment Design 43 4.1 Research Questions and Hypotheses................... 43 4.2 Participants................................ 44 4.3 Setup.................................... 44 4.4 Procedure................................. 46 4.5 Data Collection.............................. 47 5 Results 49 5.1 Analysis Method ............................. 49 5.2 Time-To-Completion........................... 50 5.2.1 ANOVA Precondition Tests ................... 50 5.2.2 Statistical Significance...................... 50 5.2.3 Results............................... 51 5.3 Shot Accuracy............................... 52 5.3.1 ANOVA Precondition Tests ................... 52 5.3.2 Statistical Significance...................... 52 5.3.3 Results............................... 52 5.4 System Usability Scale.......................... 53 5.4.1 ANOVA Precondition Tests ................... 53 5.4.2 Statistical Significance...................... 54 vii 5.4.3 Results............................... 54 5.5 Qualitative Data ............................. 54 5.6 Discussion................................. 55 6 Conclusion 58 6.1 Contributions............................... 60 6.2 Future Work................................ 60 Bibliography 63 A Pseudocode 71 A.1 PhidgetsComponent ........................... 71 A.2 ArduinoPressureSensors ......................... 72 A.3 ArduinoComponent............................ 73 A.4 HomeHikerArduino............................ 73 A.5 SpringStepperArduino .......................... 74 B Circuit Diagrams 75 B.1 Seat Controller and Home Hiker Circuit ................ 75 B.2 Spring Stepper Circuit.......................... 76 C Blueprints 77 C.1 Home Hiker Blueprints.......................... 77 C.2 Spring Stepper Blueprints ........................ 80 D Study Materials 82 D.1 Recruitment Script............................ 82 D.2 Consent Form............................... 83 D.3 Pre-Test Demographic Survey...................... 85 D.4 System Usability Scale.......................... 86 D.5 Verbal Thank-You Script......................... 87 viii List of Figures 3.1 The first design iteration.......................... 27 3.2 Phidgets Bridge Interface