COMS W4172: 3D User Interfaces—Spring 2019 Prof. Steven Feiner
Date out: February 27, 2019 Date due: March 12, 2019
Assignment 2: Voxel Populi
For this assignment, you will be exploring and evaluating the user interfaces of two voxel-based 3D modeling systems: 3D Slash (the web version only, please) and MagicaVoxel. To do this, you will need to create an account to use 3D Slash (the “FREE” version only, without signing up for any kind of limited-time trial of higher-end functionality!) and will need to download MagicaVoxel for either Win32, Win64, or macOS (also free).
You should begin by acquainting yourself with both applications, being sure to keep track of your first impressions (ideally by writing or recording), so you can include them in your assignment. Both applications have web-based documentation, and you should refer to it (and take it into account in your evaluation). Please use only the vendor-provided documentation, including web pages and videos, rather than any third-party documentation.
Description and Heuristic Evaluation
In addition to an introduction and conclusions, your evaluation should have two main sections, each based on your experience using the applications and their documentation to create and manipulate models.
In the first section, you should address the ten usability heuristics introduced in class (https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ten-usability-heuristics/), mentioning specific examples of how well 3D Slash and MagicaVoxel do or do not satisfy each heuristic. Please do this by creating ten subsections, one for each heuristic. In each subsection, you should discuss both applications, being sure to distinguish between the two applications.
In the second section, please pay special attention to the following specific areas, taking into account both cursor and keyboard interaction:
1. Camera manipulation. How the user controls any of camera position, orientation, field of view, projection type, or any other camera parameters. The space of possible camera configurations supported in each application. Relationships between changes in the parameters and how they are controlled in the user interface. (In your writing, please be sure to be clear about whether you are referring to a change in camera position vs. a change in camera field of view. Please see this article for a visual explanation of the
often misused term “zooming” vs. “dollying”. Do not take accept uncritically any description of what an application is doing.)
2. Selection. How the user selects or deselects one or more blocks or objects.
3. Geometry creation and deletion. How the user is able to add and remove blocks and
other geometric structures.
4. Geometry manipulation. How the user changes the position and orientation of geometric structures.
For each of these four areas (each of which could be made into its own subsection in your assignment document), describe and compare the techniques that allow the user to accomplish their tasks for both applications. Please describe how constraints are exploited in the interaction techniques. And please pay attention to the use of modes, and how each application supports identifying and switching between modes. It will be useful to think of some specific users and tasks that they might want to perform. Explain how these techniques work well, where they are lacking, and how they could be improved.
Please ignore functionality involving publishing and 3D printing, and any functionality that isn’t provided for free..
In considering the issues in this section of your assignment, please address any of the ten usability heuristics that you feel are particularly relevant. However, you are not limited to these heuristics, and should mention anything you think is important that these heuristics do not cover. (If you are familiar with any other applications that support similar functionality, you are welcome, but not required, to optionally draw comparisons to them.)
Note that this is a written analysis/essay assignment and there is no code involved. Please think critically and provide thoughtful, well developed descriptions, explanations, and comparisons (not bulleted lists). There is no required minimum word count, and you are not being asked to write documentation, although you are encouraged to refer to the existing documentation without repeating it. Instead, you are being asked to evaluate the usability of the applications. Therefore, you will need to make assertions about the artifacts you are evaluating (3D Slash FREE web version and MagicaVoxel) and to defend assertions you make by citing the heuristics or other criteria addressed in our books or in class, and explaining how the two applications follow or violate them.
Please include relevant screen shots in your evaluation, integrating them into your document and referring to them.
There are no limits on the length of your assignment. However,, based on our experience, a complete one will usually be no less than ten pages long. On the other hand, we will not reward
you just for writing a lot or for repeating yourself and including overly large pictures. Please talk to one of the TAs if you have any questions about this.
Hints
Imagine that you were about to interview for one of teams whose applications you are analyzing, or perhaps another company interested in creating a competing application. As you do this assignment, try to display your understanding of the two user interfaces and the tradeoffs between them in a way that would inspire confidence in a savvy technical interviewer (i.e., not the person from human resources).
Please note that one of these applications lives “in the cloud.” And, that means you are at the mercy of computers and connectivity that you don’t control. Please make sure that you do not leave the assignment for the last minute, only to discover that something is down—we will not be offering additional late days/hours to compensate for temporary downtime.
This is an individual assignment, so please treat it that way.
What to Submit
You should submit your written evaluation as a PDF file. Note, again, that screen captures should be integrated into your document, and not included as separate images. Please be sure that your name and uni appear at the beginning of the submission.
How to Submit
Your assignment should consist of a single PDF file submitted through CourseWorks in response to Assignment 2.
Immediately after uploading your submission, please check it by downloading it to make sure that it was the correct file. We will not accept excuses that you accidentally uploaded the wrong file.
Please try to submit well before the deadline, since CourseWorks can sometimes become busy and slow. You may use any number of your remaining late days on this assignment, but please start early!
Grading
Section one Section two Total
50 points 50 points 100 points