Radi-Eye: Hands-Free Radial Interfaces for 3D Interaction using Gaze-Activated Head-Crossing

ABSTRACT Eye gaze and head movement are attractive for hands-free 3D interaction in head-mounted displays, but existing interfaces afford only limited control. Radi-Eye is a novel pop-up radial interface designed to maximise expressiveness with input from only the eyes and head. Radi-Eye provides widgets for discrete and continuous input and scales to support larger feature sets. Widgets can be selected with Look & Cross, using gaze for pre-selection followed by head-crossing as trigger and for manipulation. The technique leverages natural eye-head coordination where eye and head move at an offset unless explicitly brought into alignment, enabling interaction without risk of unintended input. We explore Radi-Eye in three augmented and virtual reality applications, and evaluate the effect of radial interface scale and orientation on performance with Look & Cross. The results show that Radi-Eye provides users with fast and accurate input while opening up a new design space for hands-free fluid interaction.