• One way to enhance soldiers’ orientation and SA is by adding various sources of information (including feeds from unmanned systems) to generate a broader perspective of the environment.

This is a demonstration of a key-hole effect, where it may be difficult to determine where in the map (left) the feed shown from the UAV is located.

• Researchers and practitioners have recently begun to examine the use of several types of unmanned systems combined.
• In order to do this well, it is important to minimize the visual load imposed on the soldier, a load that is obviously increasing due to multiple parallel displays.
• Additional views can increase operator comprehension of the situation but may also cause overload and confusion. Often, too many choices, characteristics and applications may even harm the operator as much as lack of choices.

Our effort aims to examine the needs of dismounted soldiers in a multiple video feed environment (i.e., more than one source of information can be provided at a time) and to identify displays devices and interfaces that can support dismounted soldiers in such more complex intelligence gathering missions.

Combining UAV and UGV feed.

• UAVs are meant to deliver the “larger” picture and are necessary for orientation tasks.
• UGVs are meant to deliver a more focused and specific image.
• Combination of the two should be advantageous when information is complex or ambiguous e.g., one may want to detect a target and then identify its features in more detail.

This is an example of a combined display, where both UAV and UGV video feeds are shown in addition to the aerial map. Waypoints of interest are marked on the map.

Coming soon  – experimental results of attentional allocation and performance on intelligence gathering tasks in such displays.