Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Study was performed in within-subject design. The experiment contained
18 static stimuli with 2D and 3D maps of cities. The stimuli with maps were
presented in random order. To unite the starting point of the eye-movement
trajectories, the fixation cross was displayed for 500 ms before the stimulus.
Respondents had maximum time of 30 s to find the target, but for the most of the
tasks, the time was fully sufficient.
Stimuli
The experiment contained screenshots of different internet map portals. These maps
were complemented with point symbols. Two types of maps were used—the first
one was standard map with buildings represented by polygons, second contained
3D (2,5 D) visualization of buildings.
Maps from three different sources were used. The first one is well-known Google
map (stimuli 1-5). In bigger cities, the Google map in zoom 17 and higher contains
3D representation of block of buildings. These screenshots were compared with 2D
maps, which were captured in the different part of the city (where 3D coverage was
not used) or with the use of merging and scaling down of the map of the same area
in zoom 16. The maps were styled (with the use of Gmaps wizard), because the
original map available at maps.google.com contains a large amount of symbols and
labels. For the purpose of the experiment, the fictitiously placed point symbols
(designed according to the original ones from Google Maps) were used. For each
pair, the same number and set of symbols was used.
Second type of maps contained maps from OpenStreetMap.org (stimuli 6-8). In
the default version, there exists no option to display 3D block of buildings.
However, thanks to the free availability of OSM data, there exist some possibilities,
how to display 3D content. Well-known is project osmbuildings.org, which is an
additional layer to existing web maps. It is currently working with LeafletJS and
OpenLayers.
Last stimulus (map 9) also uses OpenStreetMap data through project F4Map.
This project is only in beta version, but it automatically creates the 3D variant of
cities all over the world. The map is enhanced by ground elevation, animated water,
dynamic shadows, urban and natural details. It is possible to switch between 2D and
3D version of the map, but also to change the camera angle and rotation.
The example of each type of stimuli (Google Maps, OSMbuildings and F4map)
is in the Fig.
1
.
