Study of the perception of three-dimensional spatial relations for a volumetric display

We test perception of 3-D spatial relations in 3-D images rendered by a 3-D display and compare it to that of a high-resolution flat panel display. Our 3-D display is a device that renders a 3-D image by displaying, in rapid succession, radial slices through the scene on a rotating screen. The image is contained in a glass globe and can be viewed from virtually any direction. We conduct a psychophysical experiment where objects with varying complexity are used as stimuli. On each trial, an object or a distorted version is shown at an arbitrary orientation. The subject's task is to decide whether or not the object is distorted under several viewing conditions (monocular/binocular, with/without motion parallax, and near/far). The subject's performance is measured by the detectability d, a conventional dependent variable in signal detection experiments. Highest d values are measured for the 3-D display when the subject is allowed to walk around the display.