Modifying an identified position of edged shapes using pseudo-haptic effects

Abstract

In our research, we aim to construct the visuo-haptic system which can give users a sense as if they were touching on virtual objects with variety of shapes, using pseudo-haptiec effects. In this paper, we focus on modifying the identification of a position of edges on a object when touching it with a pointing finger, by displacing the visual representation of the user's hand in order to construct a novel visuo-haptic system. We compose a video see-through system, which enables us to change the perception of the shape of an object a user is visually touching, by displacing the visual representation of the user's hand as if s/he was touching the visual shape, when in actuality s/he is touching another shape. We had experiments and showed participants perceived positions of edges that was the same as the one they were visually touching, even though the positions of edges they were actually touching was different. These results prove that the perceived positions of edges could be modified, and even if the ratio of the successive distance between edges is 1 : 1, we can modify the perception of this ratio from 3 : 2 to 2 : 3.