Finger tracking and hand recognition technologies in virtual reality maritime safety training applications
PubDate: Sep 2020
Teams: University College London；Turku University of Applied Sciences；University of the Arts London；Manchester Metropolitan University
Writers: Evangelos Markopoulos；Panagiotis Markopoulos；Niko Laivuori；Christos Moridis；Mika Luimula
Abstract
Today’s modern and technologically sophisticated ships relay significantly on the safe operations of the seafarers [1]. The maritime sector and the shipping industry in general, operates in complex environments with highly variable operational, economic, social, regulatory, political, and international challenges. This creates an operational complexity which requires from the seafarers to have the appropriate training and skills needed to manage such challenges. Maritime training and education seem to get aligned with the digital transformation powered by advanced technologies that impact the seafarer’s traditional tasks.
As of today, training on such challenges have been approached with the use of advanced simulators for the development of seafarer competencies. Furthermore, emerging immersive technologies, such as virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) transformed the concept and operations of maritime simulations and simulators with disruptive functionalityand operations on land and at sea. However, the rapid pace of the technology evolution provocatively questions what is considered today state of the art. The integration of futuristic interactive technologies with the immersive VR and AR technologies, combined with gamification and game design principles and practices can drive the overall training experience, especially in maritime, into unexplored
spaces and opportunities. Such a technological integration is demonstrated in this paper and applied on MarSEVR, an existing advanced maritime safety education technology, in an attempt to move beyond the existing blue oceans discovered with VR.
