Views, alignment and incongruity in indirect augmented reality

Alignment between the real and the virtual has been a defining quality of mixed and augmented reality. With the emergence of Indirect Augmented Reality the problem of alignment is no longer primarily concerned with the relationship between a live video feed and a 3D graphics layer at the level of the screen, but with the relationship between the visual information on the display and the real world perspective outside the display of the device. Experiments show that users easily connect the perspective into the 3D virtual environment on the full screen with their parallel perspective in the real world. It also turns out that although congruence and alignment between the two perspectives is fundamental to the user experience, in certain contexts it may be transcended. This paper describes and discusses applications of Indirect Augmented Reality where we explore how the discrepancy between the virtual and the real perspectives in a variety of ways can be used to improve the user experience. We call these features views. The views will be exemplified with several Indirect Augmented Reality applications: reconstructions of Augustus' Forum and the Republican Forum in Rome and a preconstruction of the planned National Museum in Oslo. The applications have been tested with users on location, and their feedback and evaluation is included in the discussion. Finally, we relate the experiential value of the views to some epistemological and pedagogical perspectives.