A curved surface display for three fingers based on human visual and tactile sensory fusion

In general, it is difficult to present tactile information because arbitrary curvatures of the curved surface and many degrees of freedom need to be realised. On the other hand, psychophysical studies have suggested that human visual and tactile sensations have an illusory fusion characteristic. This means that we can recognise curved surfaces of objects through visual and tactile sensations, even if exact tactile information is not presented. Hence, by utilising the human characteristic of sensory fusion, realisation of a curved surface display can be simplified. From such motivation, the human fusion characteristics of visual and tactile sensation are measured, and are quantitatively analysed. Based on the analysed results, a curved surface display for three fingers is developed. In the curved surface display, only four curved patterns are utilised instead of presenting many curved patterns. Performance of the developed tactile display is proved through evaluated experiments.