Virtual hand-button interaction in a generic virtual reality flight simulator

Flight simulators with a physical mock-up are dependent on the aircraft type and have high costs. In order to overcome high cost issues, a generic virtual reality flight simulator is designed. Virtual buttons are used without a physical mock-up to make the virtual reality flight simulator independent of the aircraft type. The classic virtual hand metaphor is employed to interact with the virtual objects. This paper examines the virtual hand-button interaction in the generic virtual reality flight simulator where no haptic feed-back is provided. The effect of the collision volume of a virtual button during the virtual hand-button interaction is determined. It is concluded that a change in the collision volume within aircraft design limits, does not have a significant impact on the interaction. We also investigate different virtual hand avatars. We find that the accuracy of hand-button interaction depends on the hand avatar rather than the collision volume. Representing a smaller part of the hand avatar results in less efficient interaction. This shows the size and shape of hand avatars plays a major role in the virtual reality simulator design. This finding contributes to the various virtual reality applications which exploit the virtual hand metaphor.