Quantifying the Effects of Smooth View Transitions on Perceptual Constancy in Node-Link Diagrams
Maruthappan Shanmugasundaram · Mspace (University of Manitoba) · 2007
Many uisualization systerns use smoothly animated transítions to help the user interact with ínformation structures.These transitíons o.re intended to preserue perceptual constancy during uiewpoint trarusformations, and to aid in the ouerall understanding of the dataset.Howeuer, animated transitions also haue costs -they increase the transítíon time, and they can be complicated to implementand it is not cleør whether the benefits of smooth transitions outweigh the costs.In order to quantify these benefits, we carried out four experiments that explore the effects of smooth trarusitions.In the ftrst study, subjects were aslz,ed to determíne whether graph nodes were connected, and nauigated the graph either with or without smooth scene transitions.In the secor¿d study, pørticipants were asked to identify the ouerall structure of a tree øfter nauigating the tree through a uíewport that either did or did not use smooth transitíons for uiew changes.The thírd experiment was simílo,r to the second experiment, but remoued the bias created by smooth transitions by gíuing the subjects total control oru the directionality of mouement.Finally the fourth experírnent tested the subject's performance in a zoomírug ínterface that used smooth transitions while transíting between the zoom-in and zoom-out uiews.The results of all four experíments show that smooth transitions cøn haue dramatíc benefits for user perforrnancefor exarnple, participants in smooth transítíon condítíons make half the errors of the discrete-mouement conditions.In addítíon, short transitions were found to be as effectiue øs long ones, suggestíng that sorne of the costs of ani.rnations caru be auoided.These studies put intuitíons about the ualue of sntooth transitions on o.n empirical footíng, and prouide practícal guidelines about when designers should use thern in uisuølization systems.