Sen-se-paration

(Short paper)

Keywords: Telehaptic, Wearables, VR Environment, Performativity, Tactile Feedback, Interaction, Virtual Reality, Spatial Sound.

This paper describes an interdisciplinary joint project that focuses on the cross-border networking of people between virtual and real space. We set up an encounter between two persons located at different places to experience the proximity between two people without any textual or verbal communication. In our experiment, one person in a virtual reality (VR) installation (CAVE) or wearing Oculus Rift glasses is able to interact with another person located in a dark room wearing a vest with vibration motors, compass and controller. The person in real space is represented as an avatar in the VR environment. The one in the real space is able to perceive the person in the virtual world with tactile and auditory senses. Spatial audio in the dark room supports the representation of the proximity of the two people and gives an intense spatial experience. The person connected to the VR environment can interact with the avatar and touch it by means of a 6 degree of freedom input device. Touching the avatar gives also visual feedback on the avatar. We separated tactile, visual and auditory feedback for this encounter in order to increase the intensity of the distant meeting.