User-defined mid-air haptic sensations for interacting with an ar menu environment

Abstract

Interfaces that allow users to interact with a computing system by using free-hand mid-air gestures are becoming increasingly prevalent. A typical shortcoming of such gesture-based interfaces, however, is their lack of a haptic component. One technology with the potential to address this issue, is ultrasound mid-air haptic feedback. At the moment, haptic sensations are typically designed by system engineers and experts. In the case of gestural interfaces, researchers started involving non-expert users to define suitable gestures for specific interactions. To our knowledge, no studies have involved – from a similar participatory design perspective – laymen to generate mid-air haptic sensations. We present the results of an end-user elicitation study yielding a user-defined set of mid-air haptic sensations to match gestures used for interacting with an Augmented Reality menu environment. In addition, we discuss the suitability of the end-user elicitation method to that end.