Design Patterns for Mobile Augmented Reality User Interfaces—An Incremental Review

Abstract

The virtual enhancement of the physical world through Augmented Reality (AR) has an enormous potential in its application, but faces challenges in its development. The lack of standards and the increased complexity of interaction opportunities complicate the definition of suitable User Interfaces (UIs). Several principles and patterns have been formulated to simplify UI design for AR applications, but their joint contribution to a positive usability as well as the influence of individual patterns remain unclear. In this paper, AR design principles from selected research were reviewed and merged into a comprehensive pattern model within an incremental process. Based on an initial model, we developed ARScribble, a mobile AR application which imitates a physical spray can to virtually sketch within a real environment. In a user-based study, we evaluated the usability of ARScribble as well as the role of individual patterns for the overall usability. We found promising indications that the pattern model implementation is related to a positive usability. The individual pattern analysis showed that AR users particularly desire a consistent and structured UI. A consistent appealing design and multimodal interaction concepts were also found to positively correlate with the overall usability. Based on these results, we included additional related work to refine the initial model into a final pattern model. To evaluate this refinement, the colAR application was developed, which allows real-world colors to be assigned to virtual objects. As a result, we found the consideration of the final pattern model to be related to a positive usability, which was confirmed in an A/B test, in which an application neglecting the pattern model showed a significantly poorer usability.