The perceived roughness of resistive virtual textures

Abstract

Klatzky and Lederman [2006] have shown that tangential resistive forces may be used to convey roughness in virtual textures using the WingMan force-feedback mouse. Modeling our experiment after this study, we directly examined the effect of viscous resistance on the perceived roughness magnitude of virtual gratings using a PHANTOM. For each virtual grating, the resistance level encountered at the ridges was varied by altering the viscosity coefficient. Perceived roughness systematically increased as the value of the viscosity coefficient was increased. The ridge-to-groove ratio contributed a small additional effect of microgeometry. These results suggest that simple models of viscous resistance may be used to simulate varying levels of surface roughness.