Haptic Technology

An Introduction to Haptics

All devices [will] need to interact. If a thing does not interact, it will be considered broken. — The Inevitable, by Kevin Kelly

Haptics relates to the science of enabling “touch” of simulated objects in a virtual environment. It is an interdisciplinary field including computer science, engineering,physics and human perception.

Haptic Technology

Haptic Technology or haptics, is a tactile feedback technology that creates an experience of touch by applying forces, vibrations or motions to the user. Haptics allows creation of controlled haptic virtual objects. “Haptics” is associated with the buzzes and click of our smartphone alerts, notifications, and the subtle way they give us feedback as we interact with the device.

Ultrahaptics

Ultrahaptics enables users to receive haptic feedback without the use of any wearable or handled devices. It creates a sense of touch in mid-air. If you have ever used a AR/VR, you must have got a sense that you are touching or controlling an object, this is nothing but Ultrahaptics.

History of Haptics

Haptic technology was first introduced in larger aircrafts to shake the controller sticks to indicate a dangerous flight condition. Since then haptics has evolved extensively, form Thomas Massie’s invention PHANTOM in 1995, which made it possible for a person to feel an object on the computer screen, to Apple’s Watch which makes use of skin tap sensing to deliver notifications.

Implementation

Now, haptics can be implemented in particularly four ways: -

• Vibration: Haptic feedbacks that we are commonly used to, are the vibrations in a mobile phone or the rumble in a game controller. This is nothing but haptics implemented in the form of vibrations. ERM (Eccentric Rotating Mass) Actuator, LRA (Linear Resonant Actuators) and Piezoelectric Actuators are mostly employed to produce vibrations.

• Force Feedback: Some devices use motor to control the movement of item held by the user. Commonly they are used in Automobile Driving games, which turn the steering wheel to simulate forces experienced when cornering a real vehicle.
• Air Vortex Rings: They are donut-shaped air pockets. Microsoft AirWave and Disney AIREAL have used these to give non-contact haptic feedback.

• Ultrasound: It can be used to create pressure on a finger without touching any physical object and it can be used to give users the ability to feel virtual 3D objects.

Applications

• Gaming: Haptic technology has its wide usage in the gaming industry. If you have ever played games on Play Station or XBOX, you must have experienced vibrations on your joystick, when you go off the track in racing games or when you are hit by someone. Few years ago, Microsoft had launched XBOX 360 with Kinect. Kinect made use of real-time gesture recognition, speech recognition and body skeleton detection. This made it possible to play games even without a joystick.

• Smart Phones: This is the era of smart phones. You may have come across certain wallpapers like in the picture below, when you touch the screen, you really feel that you are touching the surface of water. When you press a key on your smart phone, you get to feel that you are touching a genuine, raised and a smooth key.

• Medical Field: With the help of haptics a doctor can perform a surgery from a remote location by using a 3D video and a robotic arm. Haptic simulators can also be used to train medical students.

• Automobiles: Haptics can be used to alert the driver when the vehicle is close to other vehicles or if the driver is over speeding, this will help in reducing accidents.