Soft tangible interface for continuous control of virtual objects with pressure based input

This study presents deformable and flexible input system for designing 3D topography and continuous control of virtual objects via external force. The intention is to provide a tactile metaphor for pressure-based surface input. The system is constructed by layering Polymethylsiloxane (PDMS), conductive fabric, and conductive foam. In this study, two prototypes have been made (SOFTii and BendID) for: (a) utilizing the coarse silhouette from physical objects for 3D topography design, (b) implementing force input with deformable controller in video games, (c) detecting local bending deformation based on surface pressure distribution. The deformable system for 3D topography design is named SOFTii and the flexible input system is BendID. The BendID prototype possesses two pressure sensitive surfaces, while the SOFTii prototype holds one. The layer configuration allows the capturing of local pressure on the SOFTii surface via distributed soft foam electrodes. These values are utilized to indicate the coarse shape profile using stamp-and-press paradigm. The obtained coarse outline and pressure readings are employed to provide a quick and direct method for 3D topography design. In video games with BendID controller, the pressures distributed on the surface were employed to address external force as an extra input dimension for continuous parameter control. Additionally, the Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifying algorithm assists the detection of local bending deformation in BendID to reflect user intent. A user study was conducted to validate the SOFTii and BendID system for 3D topography design and continuous parameter control. The study discusses the qualitative and inquiry study results of the SOFTii and BendID system and recommend future work