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This paper describes StyleCam, an approach for authoring 3D viewing experiences that incorporate stylistic elements that are not available in typical 3D viewers. A key aspect of StyleCam is that it allows the author to significantly tailor what the user sees and when they see it. The resulting viewing experience can approach the visual richness and pacing of highly authored visual content such as television commercials or feature films. At the same time, StyleCam allows for a satisfying level of interactivity while avoiding the problems inherent in using unconstrained camera models. The main components of StyleCam are camera surfaces which spatially constrain the viewing camera; animation clips that allow for visually appealing transitions between different camera surfaces; and a simple, unified, interaction technique that permits the user to seamlessly and continuously move between spatial-control of the camera and temporal-control of the animated transitions. Further, the user's focus of attention is always kept on the content, and not on extraneous interface widgets. In addition to describing the conceptual model of StyleCam, its current implementation, and an example authored experience, we also present the results of an evaluation involving real users.

We present a new screen space widget, the IBar, for effective camera control in 3D graphics environments. The IBar provides a compelling interface for controlling scene perspective based on the artistic concept of vanishing points. Various handles on the widget manipulate multiple camera parameters simultaneously to create a single perceived projection change. For example, changing just the perspective distortion is accomplished by simultaneously decreasing the camera's distance to the scene while increasing focal length. We demonstrate that the IBar is easier to learn for novice users and improves their understanding of camera perspective.

Nested User Interface Components combine the concepts of Zooming User Interfaces (ZUIs) with recursive nesting of active graphical user interface widgets. The resulting system of recursively nesting interface components has a number of desirable properties. The level of detail of the view of any widget component and its children, as well as the responsiveness of that component to the user's actions, can be tuned to the current visible size of that component on the screen.

We distinguish between the interaction style of a component, and the semantic result that it produces. Only the latter is used to determine the geographic parameters for that component. In this way, very large and layered control problems can be presented to the user as a cohesive and readily navigable visual surface. It becomes straightforward to layout interaction semantics that are best handled by recursion, such as filters composed of nested expressions.

We introduce a set of techniques for haptically manipulating digital media such as video, audio, voicemail and computer graphics, utilizing virtual mediating dynamic models based on intuitive physical metaphors. For example, a video sequence can be modeled by linking its motion to a heavy spinning virtual wheel: the user browses by grasping a physical force-feedback knob and engaging the virtual wheel through a simulated clutch to spin or brake it, while feeling the passage of individual frames. These systems were implemented on a collection of single axis actuated displays (knobs and sliders), equipped with orthogonal force sensing to enhance their expressive potential. We demonstrate how continuous interaction through a haptically actuated device rather than discrete button and key presses can produce simple yet powerful tools that leverage physical intuition.

The personal universal controller (PUC) is an approach for improving the interfaces to complex appliances by introducing an intermediary graphical or speech interface. A PUC engages in two-way communication with everyday appliances, first downloading a specification of the appliance's functions, and then automatically creating an interface for controlling that appliance. The specification of each appliance includes a high-level description of every function, a hierarchical grouping of those functions, and dependency information, which relates the availability of each function to the appliance's state. Dependency information makes it easier for designers to create specifications and helps the automatic interface generators produce a higher quality result. We describe the architecture that supports the PUC, and the interface generators that use our specification language to build high-quality graphical and speech interfaces.