If it’s up to MIT’s Tangible Media Group, we’ll be interacting with our machines in Minority Report-like fashion in no time. That’s because the researchers have been hard at work developing a shape-shifting interface that allow users to feel and manipulate data with their hands and bodies. First came inFORM, followed by TRANSFORM, and now there’s Materiable, a shape-changing interface that lets users see and touch physical simulations.
Similar to InForm and Transform, Materiable uses an array of motor-driven blocks called “pixels” that respond to touch and emit haptic feedback. These pixels are programmed with physics algorithms that imitate materials such as sand, rubber and water. Ideally this could enable the interface to explore the properties of different materials, to prototype landscape designs, and to test complex simulations like earthquakes and tsunamis. It can even be used for educational purposes, ranging from ‘feeling’ mathematic equations to better understanding a patient’s medical information.
“As a proof-of-concept prototype, we developed preliminary physics algorithms running on pin-based shape displays. The system can create computationally variable properties of deformable materials that are visually and physically perceivable,” the team explains. “In our experiments, users identify three deformable material properties (flexibility, elasticity and viscosity) through direct touch interaction with the shape display and its dynamic movements. Our research shows that shape changing interfaces can go beyond simply displaying shape allowing for rich embodied interaction and perceptions of rendered materials with the hands and body.
What’s cool is that as a user pushes the pins with any part of their bodies, they are able to detect the pressure and push back with a varying speed and force, depending on the material being simulated. For example, the level of touch for soft foam would be firmer than it would for water.
Pretty neat stuff, right? You can read all about Materiable in its paper here, or see it in action below!