FiveStar VR: shareable travel experience through multisensory stimulation to the whole body

PubDate: December 2018

Teams: Tokyo Metropolitan University，NTT Communication Science Laboratories，University of Electro-Communications，Toyohashi University of Technology

Writers: Koichi Shimizu；Gaku Sueta；Kentaro Yamaoka；Kazuki Sawamura；Yujin Suzuki；Keisuke Yoshida；Vibol Yem；Yasushi Ikei；Tomohiro Amemiya；Makoto Sato；Koichi Hirota；Michiteru Kitazaki

PDF: FiveStar VR: shareable travel experience through multisensory stimulation to the whole body

Abstract

We have developed a multisensory virtual reality system, FiveStar VR (five senses theater for VR), that enables participants to relive or share other’s behavior through well-designed simultaneous stimulation to multiple modalities. FiveStar VR consists of somatosensory displays in addition to the conventional audiovisual VR setup. In the FiveStar VR, the body parts of the participant are forced to move, which is synchronized with those of an avatar in the VR space, resulting in inducing a strong perception of presence at the past walk behavior of someone else. By taking advantage of the cyclic nature of walking, the arms, the lower limbs, and the body are synchronously moved to simulate the sensation of real walking. These motion profiles do not completely follow the measured data of real walking but each gain of magnitude of the modalities is adjusted on the basis of the subjective intensity of motion impression, mainly due to the lack of the sensory suppression from the motor command of the participant. The demonstration of our exhibition booth presents a virtual trip to a tourist site, Toronto and Niagara Falls, Canada. A short-time experience of walking around the area is relived/shared by the attendee.