HAExplorer

The helical axis is a common tool used in biomechanical modeling to parameterize the motion of rigid objects. It encodes an object’s rotation around and translation along a unique axis. Visualizations of helical axes have helped to make kinematic data tangible. However, the analysis process often remains tedious, especially if complex motions are examined. We identify multiple key challenges: the absence of interactive tools for the computation and handling of helical axes, visual clutter in axis representations, and a lack of contextualization. We solve these issues by providing the frst generalized framework for kinematic analysis with helical axes. Axis sets can be computed on-demand, interactively fltered, and explored in multiple coordinated views. We iteratively developed and Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for proft or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the frst page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than the author(s) must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specifc permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from permissions@acm.org. CHI 2022, April 30 – May 6, 2022, New Orleans, LA © 2022 Copyright held by the owner/author(s). Publication rights licensed to ACM. ACM ISBN 978-1-4503-9157-3/22/04. . . $15.00 https://doi.org/10.1145/3491102.3501841 evaluated the HAExplorer with active biomechanics researchers. Our results show that the techniques we introduce open up the possibility to analyze non-planar, compound, and interdependent motion data.