SurfAirs: Surface + Mid-air Input for Large Vertical Displays

Large vertical surfaces such as wall displays allow users to work with a very large and high-resolution workspace. Such displays promote physical navigation: users can step close to the display to see details, but also move away to get a wider view of the workspace. In terms of input, current solutions usually combine direct touch on the wall with input on a handheld device, disconnecting close and distant input rather than treating it as a continuum. We present SurfAirs, which are physical controllers that users can manipulate on screen (surface input), in the air (mid-air input), and transition from the surface to the air during a single manipulation (hybrid input). We report on two user studies that compare SurfAirs’ performance with bare-hand input for both mid-air and hybrid input. Participants prefer and perform better with SurfAirs.