Dynamic text management for see-through wearable and heads-up display systems

Reading text safely and easily while mobile has been an issue with see-through displays for many years. For example, in order to effectively use optical see through Head Mounted Displays (HMDs) or Heads Up Display (HUD) systems in constantly changing dynamic environments, variables like lighting conditions, human or vehicular obstructions in a user's path, and scene variation must be dealt with effectively. This paper introduces a new intelligent text management system that actively manages movement of text in a user's field of view. Research to date lacks a method to migrate user-centric content such as e-mail or text messages throughout a user's environment while mobile. Unlike most current annotation and view management systems, we use camera tracking to find dark, uniform regions along the route on which a user is travelling in real time. We then implement methodology to move text from one viable location to the next to maximize readability. A pilot experiment with 19 participants shows that the text placement of our system is preferred to text in fixed location configurations.