Generating Haptic Motion Effects for Multiple Articulated Bodies for Improved 4D Experiences: A Camera Space Approach

Motion effects are indispensable for improving 4D experiences in highly interactive applications, such as amusement parks, 4D theaters, and virtual reality games. Their recent emergence calls for effective algorithms generating motion effects synchronized with audiovisual content. This paper presents an automatic algorithm for synthesizing the object-based motion effects that express the movements of multiple articulated bodies inclusively when the objects’ motion trajectories are available in the 3D camera space. By taking the visual velocities and sizes of all object parts, our method computes a motion proxy that represents the objects’ movements by one point and converts the motion proxy to a motion command through a motion cueing algorithm. The motion proxy is determined by linearly combining the velocities, and its best combination was selected from several candidates by user studies. The results of user studies indicate that our algorithm can produce compelling object-based motion effects that enhance the multisensory experience.