UPDATE (July 10th, 2021): project was successfully presented at the IEEE World Haptics Conference 2021. Link to the published paper here or here.
UPDATE (June 18th, 2021): this project and prototype will be virtually presented at the IEEE World Haptics Conference 2021 on (July 6-9, 2021). The IEEE World Haptics Conference (WHC) is the premier international conference covering various aspects of haptics, including the scientific findings, technological developments, and applications. Link to the Presentation Video here.
UPDATE (May 10th, 2021): the submitted Work-in-Progress Paper apropos of this project has been accepted for presentation at the IEEE World Haptics Conference 2021.
NOTE: a Work-in-Progress Paper concerning this project has been submitted to the IEEE World Haptics Conference 2021 (July 6-9, 2021, virtual, previously in Montreal, Canada).
The 4D cinema experience has been growing steadily for the past decade. However, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, content viewing is shifting increasingly towards at-home consumption, propelled by streaming services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Disney+. While a massive amount of content is already available on these platforms, and the 4D experience in movie theatres is well established, the home theatre equivalent has yet to gain significant popularity, in part due to the high cost of the associated systems. To address this barrier to adoption, we investigate the feasibility of augmenting the armrests of regular chairs with haptic effects that can offer some portion of the experience available to cinema-goers. As a starting point, our aim was to develop a reasonably small, robust, and low-cost armrest device capable of providing a diverse range of haptic feedback effects.
The development of the prototype was done as part of the McGill University Mechanical Engineering Capstone program (MECH 463D1/D2), over the Fall 2020 and Winter 2021 semesters. The project is affiliated to the Shared Reality Lab and its development started from the preliminary Conceptual Design phase all the way to the Final Assembly of the prototype, which was presented on Design Day.
| Side View | Top View | Top View with cloth |
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| Synchronization test | Forearm sensation test | Final picture |
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| Actuator tests | Assembly phase 1 |
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Prototype Development video
Prototype Demonstration video
IEEE World Haptics Conference 2021 Presentation Video
Work-in-Progress Paper