arXiv subjects

Christian Sandor

Publications and source records attributed to Christian Sandor.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

BlurDriving: Investigating How Personalized Blur Techniques Impact Drivers' Performance in Virtual Reality

Distracted driving remains a major safety concern, motivating approaches that aim to reduce visual overload before attention breaks down. However, visual overload varies across individuals, making it difficult to determine appropriate interventions for each driver. We investigate whether controllable visual blur can simplify the driving scene and mitigate distraction. To address this challenge, we propose BlurDriving, a target-selective, distance-aware blur system in a Virtual Reality (VR) urban driving simulator, and employ a Human-in-the-Loop Multi-Objective Bayesian Optimization (HITL-MOBO) framework to personalize blur configurations. Across two VR user studies, we evaluated driving under normal conditions in Study 1 and under cognitively demanding conditions in Study 2. We found that personalization revealed strong individual differences in blur preference but did not lead to significant improvements in objective driving performance compared to a no-blur baseline. Qualitative feedback revealed polarized responses: some drivers reported improved focus, while others experienced uncertainty, fatigue, or discomfort. These findings suggest that visual blur is not universally effective. Instead, its benefits depend on individual perceptual strategies and tolerance for visual uncertainty. This work highlights the limits of personalized visual simplification in safety-critical driving and informs adaptive in-vehicle interface design.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2026

FlowC2S: Flowing from Current to Succeeding Frames for Fast and Memory-Efficient Video Continuation

This paper introduces a novel methodology for generating fast and memory-efficient video continuations. Our method, dubbed FlowC2S, fine-tunes a pre-trained text-to-video flow model to learn a vector field between the current and succeeding video chunks. Two design choices are key. First, we introduce inherent optimal couplings, utilizing temporally adjacent video chunks during training as a practical proxy for true optimal couplings, resulting in straighter flows. Second, we incorporate target inversion, injecting the inverted latent of the target chunk into the input representation to strengthen correspondences and improve visual fidelity. By flowing directly from current to succeeding frames, instead of the common combination of current frames with noise to generate a video continuation, we reduce the dimensionality of the model input by a factor of two. The proposed method, fine-tuned from LTXV and Wan, surpasses the state-of-the-art scores across quantitative evaluations with FID and FVD, with as few as five neural function evaluations.

cs.CV↗

arXiv2025

A Design Space for Visualization Transitions of 3D Spatial Data in Hybrid AR-Desktop Environments

We present a design space for animated transitions of the appearance of 3D spatial datasets in a hybrid Augmented Reality (AR)-desktop context. Such hybrid interfaces combine both traditional and immersive displays to facilitate the exploration of 2D and 3D data representations in the environment in which they are best displayed. One key aspect is to introduce transitional animations that change between the different dimensionalities to illustrate the connection between the different representations and to reduce the potential cognitive load on the user. The specific transitions to be used depend on the type of data, the needs of the application domain, and other factors. We summarize these as a transition design space to simplify the decision-making process and provide inspiration for future designs. First, we discuss 3D visualizations from a spatial perspective: a spatial encoding pipeline, where 3D data sampled from the physical world goes through various transformations, being mapped to visual representations, and then being integrated into a hybrid AR-desktop environment. The transition design then focuses on interpolating between two spatial encoding pipelines to provide a smooth experience. To illustrate the use of our design space, we apply it to three case studies that focus on applications in astronomy, radiology, and chemistry; we then discuss lessons learned from these applications.

cs.GR↗

arXiv2024

Real-and-Present: Investigating the Use of Life-Size 2D Video Avatars in HMD-Based AR Teleconferencing

Augmented Reality (AR) teleconferencing allows separately located users to interact with each other in 3D through agents in their own physical environments. Existing methods leveraging volumetric capturing and reconstruction can provide a high-fidelity experience but are often too complex and expensive for everyday usage. Other solutions target mobile and effortless-to-setup teleconferencing on AR Head Mounted Displays (HMD). They directly transplant the conventional video conferencing onto an AR-HMD platform or use avatars to represent remote participants. However, they can only support either a high fidelity or a high level of co-presence. Moreover, the limited Field of View (FoV) of HMDs could further influence users' immersive experience. To achieve a balance between fidelity and co-presence, we explore using life-size 2D video-based avatars (video avatars for short) in AR teleconferencing. Specifically, with the potential effect of FoV on users' perception of proximity, we first conduct a pilot study to explore the local-user-centered optimal placement of video avatars in small-group AR conversations. With the placement results, we then implement a proof-of-concept prototype of video-avatar-based teleconferencing. We conduct user evaluations with the prototype to verify its effectiveness in balancing fidelity and co-presence. Following the indication in the pilot study, we further quantitatively explore the effect of FoV size on the video avatar's optimal placement through a user study involving more FoV conditions in a VR-simulated environment. We regress placement models to serve as references for computationally determining video avatar placements in such teleconferencing applications on various existing AR HMDs and future ones with bigger FoVs.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2021

Classifying Cycling Hazards in Egocentric Data

This proposal is for the creation and annotation of an egocentric video data set of hazardous cycling situations. The resulting data set will facilitate projects to improve the safety and experience of cyclists. Since cyclists are highly sensitive to road surface conditions and hazards they require more detail about road conditions when navigating their route. Features such as tram tracks, cobblestones, gratings, and utility access points can pose hazards or uncomfortable riding conditions for their journeys. Possible uses for the data set are identifying existing hazards in cycling infrastructure for municipal authorities, real time hazard and surface condition warnings for cyclists, and the identification of conditions that cause cyclists to make sudden changes in their immediate route.

cs.CV↗

arXiv2015

Breaking the Barriers to True Augmented Reality

In recent years, Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) have gained considerable commercial traction, with Facebook acquiring Oculus VR for \$2 billion, Magic Leap attracting more than \$500 million of funding, and Microsoft announcing their HoloLens head-worn computer. Where is humanity headed: a brave new dystopia-or a paradise come true? In this article, we present discussions, which started at the symposium "Making Augmented Reality Real", held at Nara Institute of Science and Technology in August 2014. Ten scientists were invited to this three-day event, which started with a full day of public presentations and panel discussions (video recordings are available at the event web page), followed by two days of roundtable discussions addressing the future of AR and VR.

cs.HC↗