Mixed reality system for industrial environment: an evaluation study

• Published in: CAAI Transactions on Intelligence Technology
• Main Authors: Andrea F. Abate, Michele Nappi, Fabio Narducci, Stefano Ricciardi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 01-12-2017
• Subjects: AR-based guidance system; assisting technicians; augmented reality; augmented reality-mixed reality; electronic equipment; industrial environment; users experience
• ISSN: 2468-2322
• DOI: 10.1049/trit.2017.0017

Enabling technologies for augmented reality (AR)/mixed reality have been improved and refined throughout the last years and more recently they seem to have finally passed the demo stage to become ready for practical industrial and commercial applications. But what are the measurable advantages in using them? This study tries to answer this question by presenting the results of a comprehensive evaluation study conducted in a real industrial environment on the widest number of real users involved in such kind of experiment so far. The assessment concerned an AR-based guidance system for assisting technicians during servicing operations on complex electronic equipment often featuring small components sometimes with a distance of a few millimetres for the ones from the others. The authors exploited the most referenced and acknowledged metrics available in literature for both objective and subjective evaluation of the data gathered, providing a detailed report about the users’ experience, to finally shed light on the real benefits of AR to the industry and on the limits still present.