Reality–virtuality continuum
A scale running from a fully real environment to a fully virtual one. In between is mixed reality: augmented reality, closer to the real, and augmented virtuality, closer to the virtual.
What problem it addresses
It sorts out terms that get used interchangeably, such as augmented, mixed or virtual reality, so you know which experience you are designing.
An example
An illustrative example: two ways to see a sofa before buying it.
They are two points on the same line: what changes is how much of the real world remains in view, and with it, what has to be designed.
Why it happens
You start from the real environment.
You add more and more virtual content.
Until you reach a fully virtual world.
Applications in design
Use it like this
Before designing, place your experience on the line: how much of the real world the person will see and what you will have to respect in it.
Avoid
Using “mixed reality” as a trendy label without saying what the person sees and does.
Don’t fall for it
The closer to the real, the more the environment rules: design for light, space and people you don't control.
6 classes
What the research says
Milgram and Kishino sorted mixed reality displays into six classes and proposed describing them with three questions: how much the system knows about the world, how faithfully it shows it, and how much it makes the person feel inside it.
Solid evidence. It is a classification, not an experiment: it helps name and compare technologies, not measure their effect.
Connections
Authors and works
- 1994
Paul Milgram and Fumio Kishino
Proposed the continuum and called mixed reality everything that combines the real and the virtual on the same display.
- 1994
Paul Milgram, Haruo Takemura, Akira Utsumi and Fumio Kishino
Placed augmented reality on the continuum, as a real environment to which virtual objects are added.
Sources
Original sources
- Milgram, P., & Kishino, F. (1994). A taxonomy of mixed reality visual displays. IEICE Transactions on Information and Systems, E77-D(12), 1321–1329. View source: Milgram, P., & Kishino, F. (1994)
- Milgram, P., Takemura, H., Utsumi, A., & Kishino, F. (1994). Augmented reality: A class of displays on the reality-virtuality continuum. In Proceedings of SPIE 2351, Telemanipulator and Telepresence Technologies. SPIE. View source: Milgram, P., Takemura, H., Utsumi, A., & Kishino, F. (1994)
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