The human haptic system, among all senses, provides unique and bidirectional communication between humans and their physical environment. Yet, to date, most human-computer interactive systems have focused primarily on the graphical rendering of visual information and, to a lesser extent, on the display of auditory information. Extending the frontier of visual computing, haptic interfaces, or force feedback devices, have the potential to increase the quality of human-computer interaction by accommodating the sense of touch. They provide an attractive augmentation to visual display and enhance the level of understanding of complex data sets. They have been effectively used for a number of applications including molecular docking, manipulation of nano-materials, surgical training, virtual prototyping, and digital sculpting. Compared with visual and auditory display, haptic rendering has extremely demanding computational requirements. In order to maintain a stable system while displaying smooth and realistic forces and torques, high haptic update rates in the range of 500-1000 Hz or more are typically used. Haptics present many new challenges to researchers and developers in computer graphics and interactive techniques. Some of the critical issues include the development of novel data structures to encode shape and material properties, as well as new techniques for geometry processing, data analysis, physical modeling, and haptic visualization. This synthesis examines some of the latest developments on haptic rendering, while looking forward to exciting future research in this area. It presents novel haptic rendering algorithms that take advantage of the human haptic sensory modality. Specifically it discusses different rendering techniques for various geometric representations (e.g. point-based, polygonal, multiresolution, distance fields, etc), as well as textured surfaces. It also shows how psychophysics of touch can provide the foundational design guidelines for developing perceptually driven force models and concludes with possible applications and issues to consider in future algorithmic design, validating rendering techniques, and evaluating haptic interfaces.

For a long time, human beings have dreamed of a virtual world where it is possible to interact with synthetic entities as if they were real. It has been shown that the ability to touch virtual objects increases the sense of presence in virtual environments. This book provides an authoritative overview of state-of-theart haptic rendering algorithms

There has been significant progress in haptic technologies but the incorporation of haptics into virtual environments is still in its infancy. A wide range of the new society's human activities including communication, education, art, entertainment, commerce and science would forever change if we learned how to capture, manipulate and reproduce haptic sensory stimuli that are nearly indistinguishable from reality. For the field to move forward, many commercial and technological barriers need to be overcome. By rendering how objects feel through haptic technology, we communicate information that might reflect a desire to speak a physically- based language that has never been explored before. Due to constant improvement in haptics technology and increasing levels of research into and development of haptics-related algorithms, protocols and devices, there is a belief that haptics technology has a promising future.

This book introduces the latest progress in six degrees of freedom (6-DoF) haptic rendering with the focus on a new approach for simulating force/torque feedback in performing tasks that require dexterous manipulation skills. One of the major challenges in 6-DoF haptic rendering is to resolve the conflict between high speed and high fidelity requirements, especially in simulating a tool interacting with both rigid and deformable objects in a narrow space and with fine features. The book presents a configuration-based optimization approach to tackle this challenge. Addressing a key issue in many VR-based simulation systems, the book will be of particular interest to researchers and professionals in the areas of surgical simulation, rehabilitation, virtual assembly, and inspection and maintenance.

The human haptic system, among all senses, provides unique and bidirectional communication between humans and their physical environment. Yet, to date, most human-computer interactive systems have focused primarily on the graphical rendering of visual information and, to a lesser extent, on the display of auditory information. Extending the frontier of visual computing, haptic interfaces, or force feedback devices, have the potential to increase the quality of human-computer interaction by accommodating the sense of touch. They provide an attractive augmentation to visual display and enhance the level of understanding of complex data sets. They have been effectively used for a number of applications including molecular docking, manipulation of nano-materials, surgical training, virtual prototyping, and digital sculpting. Compared with visual and auditory display, haptic rendering has extremely demanding computational requirements. In order to maintain a stable system while displaying smooth and realistic forces and torques, high haptic update rates in the range of 5001000 Hz or more are typically used. Haptics present many new challenges to researchers and developers in computer graphics and interactive techniques. Some of the critical issues include the development of novel data structures to encode shape and material properties, as well as new techniques for geometry processing, data analysis, physical modeling, and haptic visualization. This synthesis examines some of the latest developments on haptic rendering, while looking forward to exciting future research in this area. It presents novel haptic rendering algorithms that take advantage of the human haptic sensory modality. Specifically it discusses different rendering techniques for various geometric representations (e.g. point-based, polygonal, multiresolution, distance fields, etc), as well as textured surfaces.