Marking spatial parts within stereoscopic video images

The technology of stereoscopic imaging enables reliable online telediagnoses. Applications of telediagnosis include the fields of medicine and in general telerobotics. For allowing the participants in a telediagnosis to mark spatial parts within the stereoscopic video image, graphic tools and automatism have to be provided. The process of marking spatial parts and objects inside a stereoscopic video image is a non trivial interaction technique. The markings themselves have to be 3D elements instead of 2D markings which would lead to an alienated effect "in" the stereoscopic video image. Furthermore, one problem to be tackled here, is that the content of thestereoscopic video image is unknown. This is in contrast to 3D Virtual Realityscenes, which enable an easy 3D interaction because all the objects and their position within the 3D scene are known. The goals of our research comprised the development of new interaction paradigms and marking techniques in stereoscopic video images, as we ll as an investigation of input devices appropriate for this interaction task. We have implemented these interaction techniques in a test environment and integrated therefore computer graphics into stereoscopic video images. In order to evaluate the new interaction techniques a user test was carried out. The results of our research will be presented here.