Anusha Withana

zSense: Enabling Shallow Depth Gesture Recognition for Greater Input Expressivity on Smart Wearables

In this paper we present zSense, which provides greater input expressivity for spatially limited devices such as smart wearables through a shallow depth gesture recognition system using non-focused infrared sensors. To achieve this, we introduce a novel Non-linear Spatial Sampling (NSS) technique that significantly cuts down the number of required infrared sensors and emitters. These can be arranged in many different configurations; for example, number of sensor emitter units can be as minimal as one sensor and two emitters. We implemented different configurations of zSense on smart wearables such as smartwatches, smartglasses and smart rings. These configurations naturally fit into the flat or curved surfaces of such devices, providing a wide scope of zSense enabled application scenarios. Our evaluations reported over 94.8% gesture recognition accuracy across all configurations.

Cooking with robots: designing a household system working in open environments

We propose a cooking system that operates in an open environment. The system cooks a meal by pouring various ingredients into a boiling pot on an induction heating cooker and adjusts the heating strength according to the users instructions. We then describe how the system incorporates robotic- and human-specific elements in a shared workspace so as to achieve a cooperative rudimentary cooking capability. First, we use small mobile robots instead of built-in arms to save space, improve flexibility and increase safety. Second, we use detachable visual markers to allow the user to easily configure the real-world environment. Third, we provide a graphical user interface to display detailed cooking instructions to the user. We hope insights obtained in this experiment will be useful for the design of other household systems in the future.

ImpAct: Immersive haptic stylus to enable direct touch and manipulation for surface computing

This article explores direct touch and manipulation techniques for surface computing environments using a specialized haptic force feedback stylus, called ImpAct, which can dynamically change its effective length and equipped with sensors to calculate its orientation in world coordinates. When a user pushes it against a touch screen, the physical stylus shrinks and a rendered projection of the stylus is drawn inside the screen, giving the illusion that it is submerged in the display device. Once the users can see the stylus immersed in the digital world below the screen, he or she can manipulate and interact with the virtual objects with active haptic sensations. In this article, ImpActs functionality, design, and prototype applications are described in detail with relevance to the concept of direct touch, giving special attention to novel interaction scenarios and design challenges. Furthermore, a technical evaluation was done to study ImpActs accuracy and controlability and the results presented. This article concludes by discussing ImpActs current limitations and future perspectives as a direct touch and manipulation tool.

PINOKY: a ring that animates your plush toys

PINOKY is a wireless ring-like device that can be externally attached to any plush toy as an accessory that animates the toy, such as by moving its limbs. A user is thus able to instantly convert any plush toy into a soft robot. The user can control the toy remotely or input the movement desired by moving the plush toy and having the data recorded and played back. Unlike other methods for animating plush toys, PINOKY is non-intrusive, so alterations to the toy are not required.

An operating method for a bipedal walking robot for entertainment

Tele-existence applications for robotic systems are becoming popular and widespread. Tey enable users to control a remote machine while experiencing a sense of being in the remote location. Initially, tele-existence was used for remote de-mining and mission-critical tasks in space, to avoid risking human life. Recently it has been applied in many entertainment and gaming applications, to enable a community to play together in one virtual environment and share the experience. But existing tele-existence systems require a large-scale interface, a lot of processing power, and a large space for proper operation.

Design and implementation of distributed and scalable multimedia signage system

Digital signage systems have found many interesting applications in the areas of advertising, entertainment and education. There are a variety of digital signage architectures in use. Through this paper we present Infoshare, a distributed and scalable multimedia signage system. Infoshare is based on the architecture of a collection of autonomous signage players connected with servers via a web service interface. The signage players display XAML based screens with rich signage contents which are scheduled based on location and time. This paper provides an overview of the Infoshare system that is deployed as the news signage system of Graduate School of Media Design, Keio University.

Multi-touch steering wheel for in-car tertiary applications using infrared sensors

This paper proposes a multi-touch steering wheel for in-car tertiary applications. Existing interfaces for in-car applications such as buttons and touch displays have several operating problems. For example, drivers have to consciously move their hands to the interfaces as the interfaces are fixed on specific positions. Therefore, we developed a steering wheel where touch positions can correspond to different operating positions. This system can recognize hand gestures at any position on the steering wheel by utilizing 120 infrared (IR) sensors embedded in it. The sensors are lined up in an array surrounding the whole wheel. An Support Vector Machine (SVM) algorithm is used to learn and recognize the different gestures through the data obtained from the sensors. The gestures recognized are flick, click, tap, stroke and twist. Additionally, we implemented a navigation application and an audio application that utilizes the torus shape of the steering wheel. We conducted an experiment to observe the possibility of our proposed system to recognize flick gestures at three positions. Results show that an average of 92% of flick could be recognized.

RippleTouch: initial exploration of a wave resonant based full body haptic interface

We propose RippleTouch, a low resolution haptic interface that is capable of providing haptic stimulation to multiple areas of the body via a single point of contact actuator. Concept is based on the low frequency acoustic wave propagation properties of the human body. By stimulating the body with different amplitude modulated frequencies at a single contact point, we were able to dissipate the wave energy in a particular region of the body, creating a haptic stimulation without direct contact. The RippleTouch system was implemented on a regular chair, in which, four base range speakers were mounted underneath the seat and driven by a simple stereo audio interface. The system was evaluated to investigate the effect of frequency characteristics of the amplitude modulation system. Results demonstrate that we can effectively create haptic sensations at different parts of the body with a single contact point (i.e. chair surface). We believe RippleTouch concept would serve as a scalable solution for providing full-body haptic feedback in variety of situations including entertainment, communication, public spaces and vehicular applications.

Cooky: a cooperative cooking robot system

We propose a cooperative cooking robot system that operates with humans in an open environment. The system can cook a meal by pouring various ingredients into a boiling pot on an induction heating cooker and adjusting the heating strength according to a recipe that is developed by the user. Our contribution is in the design of the system incorporating robotic- and human-specific elements in a shared workspace so as to achieve a cooperative rudimentary cooking capability. First, we provide a graphical user interface to display detailed cooking instructions to the user. Second, we use small mobile robots instead of built-in arms to save space, improve flexibility, and increase safety. Third, we use special cooking tools that are shared with the robot. We hope insights obtained in this study will be useful for the design of other household systems in the future. A previous version of our system has been presented [1]. This demonstration will show an extended version with a new robot and improved interaction design.

FuwaFuwa: detecting shape deformation of soft objects using directional photoreflectivity measurement

Soft objects are widely used in our day-to-day lives, and provide both comfort and safety in contrast to hard objects. Also, soft objects are able to provide a natural and rich haptic sensation. In human-computer interaction, soft interfaces have been shown to be able to increase emotional attachment between human and machines, and increase the entertainment value of the interaction. We propose the FuwaFuwa sensor, a small, flexible and wireless module to effectively measure shape deformation in soft objects using IR-based directional photoreflectivity measurements. By embedding multiple FuwaFuwa sensors within a soft object, we can easily convert any soft object into a touch-input device able to detect both touch position and surface displacement. Furthermore, since it is battery-powered and equipped with wireless communication, it can be easily installed in any soft object. Besides that, because the FuwaFuwa sensor is small and wireless, it can be inserted into the soft object easily without affecting its soft properties.