Mobile Robots Tracing Visual Features for Tactile Interfaces
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current methods for providing tactile access to visual content, such as line drawings and maps, are expensive and time-consuming, and haptic feedback on touchscreen devices is not realistic.
Innovation Solution
Mobile robots equipped with a drive system, communication system, sensor system, and control system that track visual features on a display surface, allowing users to experience tactile feedback by tracing features with their hand or finger, while a guidance system provides location information through audio or haptic feedback.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If tactile versions of visual content (e.g., swell paper) are produced for blind users, then accessibility to visual content is improved, but production cost and time increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses mobile robots to trace visual features on display surfaces and create tactile copies by moving across the surface, allowing blind users to access visual content through tactile feedback without requiring expensive and time-consuming physical reproduction methods like swell paper
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces traditional mechanical tactile reproduction systems (swell paper, embossed materials) with mobile robotic systems that use sensors and haptic feedback to provide tactile access to visual content dynamically, eliminating the need for physical copy production
2Adaptability or versatility
If haptic feedback is implemented on touchscreen devices, then tactile access to visual content is improved, but realism of haptic feedback deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces mobile robots as intermediary devices between the visual display and the user's tactile sense. The robots physically trace features on the display surface and transmit tactile information through direct contact, providing more realistic haptic feedback compared to standard touchscreen haptic mechanisms
3Loss of information
If multiple mobile robots track different visual features, then information layer differentiation is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the visual content into different information layers, with each mobile robot assigned to track specific visual features representing different layers. This segmentation allows blind users to access multiple layers of information independently through tactile feedback from different robots
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
Enables a realistic and efficient tangible tactile interface for visual content, allowing users to distinguish different layers of information through unique tactile features, enhancing accessibility and understanding of spatial relationships.
Implementation Method 1
a sensor system configured to detect the visual features on the display surface
Implementation Method 2
The mobile robot comprises a haptic feedback system, and wherein presenting the location information to the user comprises sending an instruction to the mobile robot to actuate the haptic feedback system
Data Source
AI summary
A system for using mobile robots that track visual features of a drawing to create a tangible tactile interface for a user. The user places a hand or finger on a mobile robot to trace and consequently cognize features of interest. The mobile robot tracks visual features and reports a location of the mobile robot to a guidance system. The guidance system presents location information to the user.