Finding Layers Using Hover Visualizations research - May 2019

Author

Evan Shimizu, Sylvain Paris, Matt Fisher, Kayvon Fatahalian
Presented at Graphics Interface 2019

In 2D digital art software, it is common to organize documents in to layers that are composited to create the final image, mimicking the traditional technique of creating an image by drawing on stacked transparent celluloid sheets. While intuitive, the layer stack suffers from problems of scale and organization. Documents with many layers are unwieldy to edit, finding a specific layer is akin to finding a needle in a haystack. This paper presents a click and hover interaction which visualizes the impact of a layer in the context of the full resolution composited image, providing an easier and faster way to identify layers in complex compositions. Through a user study, we find that users prefer to use hover visualizations in all cases, and that in compositions with many overlapping, semi-transparent layers, users are able to locate layers twice as fast with the click and hover interface.