Use of image space not as a metaphor but as a genuine information carrier that is reactive to visual querries by users
- focus and context
- omnipresence of all information in the frame of perception
- visual memory of the interaction
4.3.3.1.Fixed
Topology
The grid tracks the point of attention and each cell contains an attention counter
that is constantly updated.The scaling is row and column based to keep orthogonality.I
later found similar work by Y.K.Leung from Swin- burne University of Technology
in his paper “A review and Taxonomy of Distortion-Oriented Presentation Techniques
”featured in the col- lection Information visualization -using vision to think
and by Ramana Rao and Stuart K. Card “The table lens...”from Xerox Palo Alto
Research Center..My implementation of the distortion grid differs from previous
implementations in that it uses a simple accumulative attention tracking system
where each cell has a counter which is used in determining the final proportion
as opposed to the formula based approach of the earlier work.The difference
is mainly that the cells have a sense of history since their expansion takes
some time to restore itself and therefore the users movement pattern is visible
over time.In addition I explored the notion of his- tory in the navigation of
the grid.The interesting effect is that if the navigation history is drawn as
geometrically based on the center of the cells vis- ited in time,the geometry
changes constantly while the topology remains the same.
Defining
Digital Space Through a Visual Language
SMArchS Thesis, MIT June 2000
