HMD Calibration and Its Effects on Distance Judgments

Most head-mounted displays (HMDs) suffer from substantial optical distortion, and vendor-supplied specifications for field-of-view often are at variance with reality. Unless corrected, such displays do not present perspective-related visual cues in a geometrically correct manner. Distorted geometry has the potential to affect applications of HMDs, which depend on precise spatial perception. This article provides empirical evidence for the degree to which common geometric distortions affect one type of spatial judgment in virtual environments. We show that minification or magnification in the HMD that would occur from misstated HMD field of view causes significant changes in distance judgments. Incorrectly calibrated pitch and pincushion distortion, however, do not cause statistically significant changes in distance judgments for the degree of distortions examined. While the means for determining the optical distortion of display systems are well known, they are often not used in non-see-through HMDs due to problems in measuring and correcting for distortion. As a result, we also provide practical guidelines for creating geometrically calibrated systems.