Displaying haptic interaction with a synthesized model of real objects using SPIDAR-mouse

We have developed a haptic interaction system that enables us to interact with a synthesized model of real objects using the SPIDAR-mouse. Although the SPIDAR-mouse is convenient for displaying haptic feedback in a PC environment, the force presented with the SPIDAR-mouse is limited to 2D lateral force. Although a gradient-based method is typically used for generating 2D lateral force in haptic rendering, it did not have sufficient performance in representing geometric shapes. We therefore introduced an impulse-based method to the haptic rendering in representing bump information with 2D lateral force. In addition, a polygon reduction function was implemented to reduce the number of polygons in the synthesized model, improving performance in response. A preliminary experiment was conducted to evaluate the haptic interaction system. The results indicated that users were able to distinguish 3D shapes with distinctive geometric conditions, but had difficulty distinguishing fine differences such as similar types of bumps.