Abstract@ACADIA '97
Design Evaluation Based On Virtual Representation
Of Spaces
Celine Pinet
VISTa Lab, Ohio University
When spaces are evaluated, clients and architects often discuss design proposals by looking down at scale models. This overhead perspective forces viewers to imagine themselves looking and moving about within the model. Misperceptions may well result from such a point of view. With the advancement in virtual reality (VR) technology, and with its rising popularity in architecture, it is becoming plausible to consider using VR to evaluate design projects.
The projects presented here are of three types:
- The first project compares people's evaluation of several slightly modified virtual models of a space.
- The second project compares how people evaluate a foam core model of a space to how they evaluate a virtual representation of the same space
- The third project compares people's evaluation of a real space to that of a virtual representation of this space.
The wide range of results presented provides one argument in support of using VR simulations to study spaces and how they are perceived.
For example, results shows that a virtual window serves to alleviate perceived crowding and that added furniture serves to make a virtual room feel slightly larger and less constraining. However, problems did emerge with using virtual reality simulations to gain information about peoples' behavioral reactions to a space. Thus, not all circumstances under which VR representations are used creates valid results. Differences appear to be in the type of evaluations measured (e.g. dimensional versus behavioral). More research is needed to clarify this issue.