Heesook Shin

A tactile emotional interface for instant messenger chat

Instant Messaging (IM) is becoming as the dominant means of communication over the Internet. The popularity of IM has led to significant developments in the sophistication of the software. There have been a number of attempts to deliver emotional content through IM. The sense of touch has been a focus in a number of these research projects [1], [2], but there have been no implementations of tactile IM that have successfully bridged the gap to public, widely deployed use. In this paper, we describe a tactile interface designed to convey emotional content and focused on intuitive input and sensorial output methods to be applied in a public IM client. The initial stage of this research involved a fundamental investigation into IM usage patterns. We distributed a questionnaire to gain insight into users requirements, and received completed results from 79 people in their twenties (32 male and 47 female). Regarding how the tactile stimulus should be integrated into the environment, 50% felt a mouse (26%), a glove (14%), or a keyboard (10%) based display would be appropriate and afford easy physical contact during IM. Furthermore, they expressed a desire for tools to enable them to easily author their own tactile sensations. From the data gathered in this survey we developed a design concept for the physical interface. And we selected a set of emoticons most used in IM and defined both tactile and visual information to help emotional expression for each emoticon. We named these enhanced emoticons TCONs (TouchCON, Touch Emoticon). We defined 6 TCONs and 3 intuitive tangible input methods. We played our TCONs on a physical interface device, called the TCON Display, during public IM. The TCON Display consisted of three components, two devices shaped like cartoon hands, the other like a pair of lips. These devices included various output and input systems: vibrating motors, pin actuators, Heat coil, pressure sensors, buttons and LEDs. We also implemented a TCON Editor to allow users to create TCONs and for testing our research. The TCON was applied to a public IM system, NateOn, just like graphical emoticons. We tested the TCONs and tactile emotional interface system with 12 users test in their twenties (6 male and 6 female) and received a positive response.

Haptic interaction with user manipulation for smartphone

This paper presents haptic interaction design and implementation for our designed smartphone bumper case [1] providing an interactive and a realistic physical feeling. The thin actuator is installed in the case to simulate a rapid realistic response. We designed a software structure guaranteeing a realtime physical response. The designed API can be used to provide realistic touch responses corresponding to an interactive physical feeling during gaming applications corresponding to sound effects.

SHIFT: interactive smartphone bumper case

This paper introduces a novel smartphone bumper case providing an interactive touch sense and a realistic physical feeling. The thin and rapidly responding film-like actuator installed in the case simulates a physical response. A battery and a wireless communication controller are also embedded for the implementation of a stand-alone device. As the case is designed to be assembled with a smartphone and the assembly does not require any hardware revision of the smartphone, the proposed device has high compatibility with current consumer products. We designed a software structure guaranteeing a real-time physical response. The API can be used to provide realistic touch response and a user test is conducted for a comparison with the conventionally used vibrator in a mobile device.

Multi-point touch input method for Korean text entry

Multi-touch interfaces are becoming popular as a new input means for the various applications. In this paper, we suggest a new Korean text entry method using a multi-touch interface called MPT (Multi-Point Touch) input method. We conducted a text entry performance test comprising 4 sessions for 10 participants, and compared the result with an existing commercial SPT (Single-Point Touch) input method. The experimental results show that the entry speed of MPT was slower than that of SPT method in the initial session. However, the entry speed of MPT input method was improved more rapidly than the speed of SPT method as sessions were proceeded. We observed a statistically significant learning effect from the result of MPT method. Moreover, we found no significant difference between the task loads of SPT and MPT input methods.

A haptic touchscreen interface for mobile devices

In this paper, we present a haptic touchscreen interface for mobile devices. A surface actuator composed of two parallel plates is mounted between a touch panel and a display module. It generates haptic feedback when a user input on a touch screen. The electrostatic force is generated when two parallel plates are charged and this phenomenon causes haptic feedback. When an input is detected on the touch screen, multimodal feedback that includes not only basic visual and auditory feedback but also haptic feedback occurs appropriately. Then, a user feels realistic physical feeling in the fingertips and it provides the feeing such as pressing a real keyboard. We have designed and implemented an actuator, thin and transparent, to provide haptic feedback and an interactive architecture to perform multimodal output.

A design of cell-based pin-array tactile display

In this paper, we propose cell-based pin-array tactile display which uses cell-based pins that express 2D-shape of character (letter, digit, etc.) in the form of line unlike general pins that offer stimulation of spot form. Human operator recognizes the information of letter or digit by scanning tactile display devices surface freely using skin tissue of users fingertip. We examined the possibility of practical usage as small tactile display for mobile and wearable environment through implementation of devices simple model and users test.

Estimating the Number of Clusters with Database for Texture Segmentation Using Gabor Filter

This paper addresses a novel solution of the problem of image segmentation by its texture using Gabor filter. Texture segmentation has been worked well by using Gabor filter, but there still is a problem; the number of clusters. There are several studies about estimating number of clusters with statistical approaches such as gap statistic. However, there are some problems to apply those methods to texture segmentation in terms of accuracy and time complexity. To overcome these limits, this paper proposes novel method to estimate optimal number of clusters for texture segmentation by using training dataset and several assumptions which are appropriate for image segmentation. We evaluate the proposed method on dataset consists of texture image and limit possible number of clusters from 2 to 5. And we also evaluate the proposed method by real image contains various texture such as rock stratum.

Improved and accessible e-book reader application for visually impaired people

This1paper presents a study of an accessible e-book reader application for visually impaired people. We interviewed 27 visually impaired people to understand their usage patterns of e-books and user requirements in terms of functions and interface of an e-book reader application. Based on this survey, we were able to establish the basic direction of development of our e-book reader application; we implemented the first version of the e-book reader focusing on basic functionality. This version of the e-book reader obtained a value of user satisfaction of more than 75% in the usability test. We are continuing to develop the next version of this e-book reader with differentiated functions for reading professional books that include equations, tables, graphs, and so on. In addition, we are considering supporting a simple and fast input method and providing personalized UI. Beyond ebook readers, we hope that our study will be useful when designing and developing various mobile applications, considering that visually impaired users want to obtain information and experience equal to that available to the non-visually disabled.

Performance comparison of tap gestures on small-screen touch devices

This paper describes a new type of tapping touch gesture called different-finger tap. We classified four tapping gestures as expanding tap gestures and performed a user experiment to investigate their tapping speed and error count during button touch interaction together with the different-finger tap gesture. The results showed that the different-finger tap gesture led to faster tapping time than the long-tap gesture and a lower error count than that seen with the double-tap gesture, although users were required to perform complex mental activities to use the different-finger tap gesture because it was unfamiliar. Participants reported that the different-finger tap gesture was the most suitable for tasks that require the tapping of small buttons correctly and quickly, such as text entry, when it was used together with the single-tap gesture.

Development of multimodal surface interface for audio and tactile feedback

This paper deals with the development of a surface multimodal interface system for audio and tactile feedback. The multimodal interface system consists of a PVDF film and an ITO glass. We have controlled the applied voltage between the PVDF film and ITO glass for the tactile feedback. Similarly, we have controlled the applied voltage between the transparent electrodes on both sides of PVDF film for audio feedback. This paper shows the performance of the developed surface multimodal interface system.