“Mochitsuki: A real-object-based, interactive haptic interface”
Conference:
Experience Type(s):
Title:
- Mochitsuki: A real-object-based, interactive haptic interface
Description:
In order to provide a high-quality and interactive haptic experience, we propose an approach that breaks down the haptic experience into multiple elements and assigns optimal devices to each element, either a physical device or an electronically-controllable device. As an example of this design approach, we built a VR system that provides the experience of Mochitsuki. We designed a more durable system than the initial prototype. In reproducing the mochitusuki experience by haptic sensation, the important elements are the impulsive reaction force at the moment the pestle impacts the rice cake, the feeling that the rice cake stretches sticking to the pestle, which then falls away when the participant raises the pestle higher. Because it is very difficult to reproduce these feelings using a generic haptic device, we designed the system to take advantage of using real objects to provide realistic haptic sensations, while parts of the system are electronically controllable to make the system interactive. For the Rice cake device, we used a tear-resistant bag filled with slime as a real object that has physical properties similar to rice cake. To reproduce the phenomenon of the rice cake stretching and sticking to the pestle, we used a tear-resistant bag filled with iron powder, sticking to a neodymium magnet installed at the tip of pestle. The four corners of the iron-powder bag are connected to wires with springs to let the iron-powder bag detach when the user raises the pestle higher. In real mochitsuki, along with the steamed rice turning into rice cake, the viscosity also increases such that the pestle will not hit the bottom of rice mortar, and the rice cake becomes stickier and more stretchable. To represent such changes during the mochitsuki process, we incorporated electronic devices controlled by a computer for each subsystem.
References:
[1] Hiroshi Ishii and Brygg Ullmar. 1997. Tangible Bits: Towards Seamless Interfaces between People, Bits and Atoms. Proc. ACM CHI ’97 (1997), 234–241.
[2] Thomas H. Massie and J. Knneth Salisbury. 1994. The PHANToM Haptic Interface: A Device for Probing Virtual Objects. Proc. ASME Winter Annual Meeting, Symp. On Haptic Interfaces for Virtual Environment and Teleoperator Systems (1994).
