Using virtual reality in the structural measurement of plantation Pinus radiata

Point cloud is a set of data points that is generally used for big data visualisation. Point cloud can render massive and complex data points in 3D space to represent objects or structures. Advanced user interfaces are widely integrated into modern computing devices enabling interaction between human and large data. Virtual Reality (VR) technologies have demonstrated their potential to provide virtual environment as a medium in exploration of large point cloud data, which is crucial in data analysis. VR technologies have showed positive results when integrated as training/simulation to some domains such as economic, military defence, and education. Integrating point cloud data into immersive VR could potentially support structural estimation of point cloud. This research focuses on the structural estimation of the point cloud data in VR using radiata pine plantation data. This research compares task performance between VR-point cloud assessment and field assessment, focusing on radiata pine plantation data. In addition to the task performance comparison, feedback about experience and impression of assessing radiata pine in VR-point cloud was collected from practitioners and analysed both quantitatively and qualitatively. Results from this research are useful to reveal the strengths and weaknesses of the VR-point cloud for structural estimation tasks in radiata pine trees.