Delivering contextual data via an Augmented Reality (AR) wearable shows promise in accelerating tactical decision making while enhancing situational awareness for dismounted soldiers in call-for-fire scenarios. The military can leverage commercialized industrial solutions like the DAQRI Smart Helmet (DSH), an AR platform that provides a transparent optical display with state-of-the-art performance specifications in a comfortable, durable, user-friendly form factor operational in full daylight. The DSH can be cost-effectively upgraded to provide USMC Ground Forces with an advanced tool for enhancing decision making and situational awareness. Our proposed DAQRI Augmented Reality Situational Awareness and Decision Support Synthetic Vision System (DARSADS SVS) combines the existing DAQRI AR platform (DSH) with Lockheeds current Wide Area Augmented Reality (WAAR) project which integrates with target designation system KILSWITCH, enabling a seamless transition from training to battlefield operations. DARSADS SVS provides a foundation for prototyping information visualizations informed by experimentally validated cognitive models such as Salience, Effort (inhibition), Expectancy, Value (SEEV) capable of predicting attention tunneling. Our tactical, real-time AR decision support will incorporate the lessons learned from decades of aviation HUD design research to mitigate attention and perception limitations thanks to our collaboration with the premier expert in the field, Dr. Chris Wickens.
Benefit: We envision that the initial commercialization of this system will be in an existing Marine Corps Program of Record (POR) where AITT is currently in use and the POR where KILSWITCH is already in use, namely the USMC Target Handoff System, the USMC Program of Record for acquisition, localization, and digital handoff of targets to air and ground weapon platforms, where it is fielded to Forward Observers, JTACs, JFOs, Reconnaissance Teams, and similar roles. The following are example interested parties for the training portion of the DARSADS SVS: Infantry Officer Course at NAWC-WD China Lake, Joint Terminal Attack Controller (JTAC) and observer community, Headquarters Marine Corps (HQMC) Aviation, and the USMC Program Manager for Training Systems (PM TRASYS). DAQRI has partnered with Lockheed Martin, which will assist the commercialization of DARSADS SVS in the long term, given the need for an optical-see-through AR HMD in their current Wide Area Augmented Reality (WAAR) research and development effort, which builds upon the pre-existing AITT system. Lockheed has developed and will continue to provide insight and experience in productization for both defense and commercial applications. Beyond being an exceptional training aid, DARSADS SVS could one day provide every soldier with a common operating picture of the battlespace and deliver an unmatched competitive edge. In addition to Marine Corps and other armed forces training and operations, the core components of the DARSADS SVS system could be modified so as to be applicable to other high risk/high demand work domains with large amounts of integrated information demands, such as Law Enforcement, First Responders, and Emergency Medicine. In terms of the AR industry, we believe that the cognitive and psychological contributions of DARSADS SVS to our understanding of the design of AR information and data visualizations will have broad implications relating to the implementation of AR interfaces outside of the military.
Keywords: Synthetic Vision System, Synthetic Vision System, Situational Awareness, Call-for-Fire Training, Head-Mounted Display, Call-for-Fire Operations, Decision-making, Augmented Reality, Small Unit Forces
