Broadband Analysis of Collaborative Haptics

Introduction

Novint Falcon haptic device This project investigates techniques that will allow an additional human sense, haptic touch to be sent over the Internet. Currently, networks are designed to carry information that stimulates two human senses: the auditory sense (e.g. VoIP) and the visual sense (e.g. video, graphic, text etc). However, the introduction of haptics in the medical field for training purposes has proven the importance of simulating this sense. We are at the dawn of the widespread use of haptic devices in a multitude of application domains. With the introduction of the Falcon haptic interface (Novint™ Technologies) such devices are not a "laboratory specimen" anymore but become a "household appliance."

Current Research

Research Objectives

Our primary objective is to investigate a distributed haptic environment for collaborative objects manipulation by measuring the effects of network delay and jitter on the visuo-haptic task performance.

Implementation

Screen Shot Screen Shot We developed a collaborative visual-haptic stacking cube task, where two remote users manipulate four cubes displayed randomly in the CVE. Each of the users manipulates a haptic device that has a representation in the virtual environment of a sphere. The goal of the task is to stack all four cubes on a central stacking pedestal by applying forces to opposite sides of the cubes with two haptic devices and simultaneously lifting the cubes using simulated friction. In order to accomplish this, one participant must apply force to one side of the cube with a haptic device. The other participant must apply an equal opposing force on the opposite side of the cube with the other haptic device. Once in the air, the participants must move the cube towards the stacking pedestal while maintaining the appropriate amount of force. The task is not complete until all four cubes are stacked.

By having participants go through the task ten times while simulating 5 different latencies, we are able to analyze the effects of network latency on a collaborative task.

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