Dance with Rhythmic Frames: Improving Dancing Skills by Frame-by-Frame Presentation

Fitness video observation is a common approach in sports practice. However, in videos, important frames and others are presented at a constant speed, there is a substantial cognitive load in accurately capturing key movements and timing, especially in the quick-paced videos of complex activities such as dance. We hypothesize that extracting keyframes from dance videos and replaying them in sync with rhythm (frame-by-frame presentation) can reduce this cognitive load and improve the dance technique execution. Our first study using a 2D display suggests that frame-by-frame presentation is not only as preferred as conventional videos, but also enables more accurate learning of movements. Based on that, we developed DRF, a VR application that combines frame-by-frame presentation with motion trajectory visualization. User study results indicate that with DRF, users could significantly improve both choreographic dance technique and rhythm accuracy compared to video-based VR systems. Qualitative user evaluations from beginners, experienced dancers, and professionals expressed the benefits and potential use of the frame-by-frame presentation method.