Lessons learned from employing multiple perspectives in a collaborative virtual environment for visualizing scientific data

This paper explores the concept of multiple perspectives to enhance collaboration by allowing remote participants to tailor their views, user-interfaces and roles to their particular needs and expertise. It describes a preliminary design study conducted on users of a collaborative CAVE-based virtual reality tool for visualizing oceanographic data. Results will focus on the patterns of activity within this environment, in particular the manner in which participants transition between individual and group work during the course of a collaborative session.