Tangential force input for touch panels using bezel-aligned elastic pillars and a transparent sheet
Yuriko Nakai, Shinya Kudo, Ryuta Okazaki, Hiroyuki Kajimoto · 2014
This research aims to enable tangential force input for touch panels by measuring the tangential force. The system is composed of a plastic sheet on a touch panel, urethane pillars on the panel that are aligned at the four corners of the bezel, and a case on top of the pillars. When the sheet moves with a finger, the pillars deform so that a tangential force can be obtained by measuring the movement of the finger. We evaluated the method and found that the system showed realistic force sensing accuracy in any direction. This input method will enable development of new applications for touch panels such as using any part of the touch panel surface as joysticks, or modeling virtual objects by deforming them with the fingers.