TableMorph: Haptic Experience with Movable Tables and Redirection

We presented ”TableMorph,” a novel method that combines redirection techniques and encountered-type haptic displays. In this method, concave and convex-shaped tables with mobile robots move through the real environment according to the relative positions of the user and the virtual tables in the virtual environment. In the process, by using redirection techniques that change the position and orientation of the user’s virtual hand and the shape of the virtual tables visually presented through the head-mounted display from the actual one, the system can make them feel, both visually and haptically, that the table has a shape very different from the real one. In the demonstration at SIGGRAPH ASIA 2023 E-tech, participants can try virtual mazes as an application of the proposed method. As the users move around in the virtual maze separated by tables, the arrangement of the tables in the real environment changes. This allows for the presentation of various types of mazes that are four times larger than the physical space.