Are haptic feedback and projection ingredients for better meals?
29 August 2012
A team from the Tokyo Institute of Technology is combining force feedback technology with a form of pepper’s ghost to create a cooking simulator which it hopes will enable people to eventually cook better meals in the home. The system includes a pan connected to force actuators, which simulate the weight of the contents and the movement of a virtual spoon, also connected to actuators. A projected overlay provides real-time updates to food appearance.
Looking at the video posted by Diginfo.TV it looks like the projection system is a basic form of Pepper’s Ghost, using a short-throw projector driven by a PC and half-mirrored film between the viewer and the rig.
According to the designers, the PC is running a complex set of software and databases.
"This technology combines a rigid-body physics engine library and a heat conduction simulator. The heat conduction state changes in line with the amount of physical contact, and the simulation is achieved by combining them."
"This system also calculates how moisture evaporates or flows as the temperature rises. It shows how protein changes colour from red to brown, or how vegetables turn dark, by synthesising textures."