Context. 3D visualisations are highly demanded in different industries such as virtual factories. However, the benefits that 3D representations can bring to this industry have not been fully explored, being most of the representations either photorealistic or presenting abstract visualisations. Objectives. This thesis explores and compares two prototypes that present a visualisation of the process state of a factory. The first prototype presents a generic interface in which primitive 3D shapes convey the information of the factory status. The second prototype is complemented with specific and iconic 3D models of the factory that help the users associating the conveyed information to the factory flow. The motivation behind this dissertation is that the type of generic interface presented can lead to more reusable interfaces in the future. Methods. For the creation and development of the prototypes, the user-centered design process was followed in which the designs are iterated with users of the factory. Based on the two prototypes, a usability evaluation is conducted to analyse the perceived usability and the usability performance. This is complemented with post-interviews with all the participants. The results are presented attending to the triangulation methodology to support the strength of the qualitative findings. Conclusions. The results show that both interfaces are perceived as highly usable. However, the 3D iconic interface seemed to help the users more in depicting a better mental model of the factory flow, helping the users to complete most of the tasks with faster times.

This thesis explores and compares two prototypes that present a visualisation of the process state of a factory. The first prototype presents a generic interface in which primitive 3D shapes convey the information of the factory status. The second prototype is complemented with specific and iconic 3D models of the factory that help the users associating the conveyed information to the factory flow. The motivation behind this dissertation is that the type of generic interface presented can lead to more reusable interfaces in the future.