Nintendo Revolution's controller technology?

[j^aws]

Immersion Provides Touch Feedback for Touchscreens


TouchSense Technology Supplies the Confirming Feel of Physical Buttons



BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 24, 2005--Immersion Corporation (Nasdaq:IMMR), a leading developer and licensor of touch feedback technology, is introducing its TouchSense® technology for touchscreens at the SID Symposium. Attendees can experience touch feedback technology in a touchscreen by visiting booth 533 or attending the Exhibitors' Forum session on Wednesday, May 25, 10:30 a.m. in Exhibit Hall D.


TouchSense technology supplies tactile cues, noticeably absent in current touchscreens, providing a more intuitive, personal, and natural experience. Instead of just feeling the hard, unresponsive touchscreen surface, users perceive that buttons depress and release, just as physical buttons and switches do. This realistic and engaging response restores the rich tactile information conveyed through physical controls, such as when clicking a computer mouse, pushing a button, or depressing a membrane switch. System designers can synchronize TouchSense tactile sensations with sound and on-screen graphical images for an even more powerful user experience.


Immersion first implemented its TouchSense force feedback technology in 1996 in gaming system peripherals. Since that time, it has been incorporated into numerous computer and video console systems; medical simulation systems; rotary controls in cars from BMW, Rolls Royce, and Volkswagen; and mobile phones from Samsung. TouchSense technology for touchscreens is the latest implementation.


Applications


Many touchscreen applications can be improved or expanded with TouchSense technology. For example, menu items programmed to supply a pulse sensation or a confirming push-back response may help machine operators improve efficiency. Buttons such as Enter, Next, and other major and minor functions can supply a distinct and consistent feel throughout a kiosk application to assist consumers. And on-screen automotive controls can exhibit increasing or decreasing vibrations corresponding to fan speed, radio volume, or light level to help reduce glance time.


"TouchSense technology allows the user's sense of touch to join sight and sound for a more multisensory and engaging experience, one that can enhance performance, productivity, safety, or fun," said Dean Chang, Immersion CTO. "Touchscreen manufacturers and integrators can use this vibro-tactile, or haptic, technology to provide a more satisfying user experience for applications from automotive and industrial controls to point of sale, kiosk, and gaming."


How It Works


TouchSense technology for touchscreens involves actuators, controllers, haptic effect authoring software, and application programming interfaces (APIs) that let designers focus on haptic effect creation rather than on the mechanics of programming. When a user touches the screen, an analog signal is sent to the touchscreen controller, which supplies information on the precise screen location where contact was made. This location information is sent to the host application, which commands Immersion's haptic controller to play a specific vibro-tactile effect corresponding to the user's selection.


A key feature of TouchSense technology is that its haptic effects can vary in frequency, waveform, magnitude, and duration. The result is that all sorts of on-screen buttons, switches, and other controls can supply distinct sensations to allow greater discrimination for users and more extensive applicability for OEMs and developers. In addition, TouchSense technology can be used with all types and sizes of touchscreens, including capacitive, infrared, resistive, and surface acoustic wave, without affecting optic clarity.


Availability


Immersion will begin selling demonstration touch monitors integrated with TouchSense technology, which will be suitable for testing design concepts, in June. Development kits for integration of the technology by OEMs or system integrators are expected to be available in Q3 2005. Immersion also offers design assistance and customized services. More information about TouchSense technology for touchscreens is available at www.immersion.com/touchscreen/ or by contacting Mike Levin at 408-467-1900 or controls@immersion.com.


About Immersion (www.immersion.com)


Founded in 1993, Immersion Corporation is a recognized leader in developing, licensing, and marketing digital touch technology and products. Bringing value to markets where man-machine interaction needs to be made more compelling, safer, or productive, Immersion helps its partners broaden market reach by making the use of touch feedback as critical a user experience as sight and sound. Immersion's technology is deployed across automotive, entertainment, medical training, mobility, personal computing, and three-dimensional simulation markets. Immersion and its wholly-owned subsidiaries hold more than 270 issued patents worldwide.

SOURCE: Immersion Corporation

If Nintendo licensed this tech or if they had a similar tech, the Revolutions controller could be adapted to a touchscreen controller with NO conventional face buttons.

This would then allow for custom tactile feedback buttons and configurations tailored to individual games. I'd still expect an analogue stick and shoulder buttons to complement it still with perhaps the infamous gyro technology making an appearance too! Seems to fit with Nintendo's recent touchy, feely stance!

 

[GwymWeepa]

Yeah my friend pointed this info out on another messageboard...and pointed out how Immersion had suspiciously left Nintendo alone with its lawsuits...maybe they're in bed together? heh

 

[pc999]

That would be very nice.

 

[jvd]

Yeah my friend pointed this info out on another messageboard...and pointed out how Immersion had suspiciously left Nintendo alone with its lawsuits...maybe they're in bed together? heh

or perhaps they went to nintendo said your infringing , nintendo backed down , came to an agreement and started to develop this ?

 

[mckmas8808]

I have some kind of this tech in my car. I have an Alpine flipout TV in my car and when you press things on the screen you can feel the feed back pulsing. It very neat, but I still can't see how this could be turned into a controller.

Maybe I'm not thinking hard enough, but I have to see this is get a better understanding of it.

 

[Teasy]

or perhaps they went to nintendo said your infringing , nintendo backed down , came to an agreement and started to develop this ?

I don't know, I think we would have heard about the deal in the commotion surrounding Sony's case, like we did with Microsofts deal. Maybe Nintendo have there own very slightly different patented rumble technology so Immersion didn't have a case against them.

On the other hand perhaps Nintendo have had a deal with Immersion since before the N64 was released.

 

[GwymWeepa]

Yeah my friend pointed this info out on another messageboard...and pointed out how Immersion had suspiciously left Nintendo alone with its lawsuits...maybe they're in bed together? heh

or perhaps they went to nintendo said your infringing , nintendo backed down , came to an agreement and started to develop this ?

That's possible as well, and would fit in the "in bed together" comment...basically they're still not going after Nintendo because Nintendo is using their technology for Revolution's controller.

 

[pegisys]

I don't think nintendo uses the same type of rumble, what sony and microsoft got sued for is having 2 motors with different sized weights on each, I think the gamecube only has one motor right in the middle

 

[Any1]

I'm having trouble understanding how this tech works. From what i do understand, it requires a screen to be placed over a touchscreen. And that screen can be manipulated into protruding certain areas to mimic a button which can be pressed with resistance to give the impression of it being a physical button.

And these protrusions can be placed anywhere and can take up as much space as desired by the software. Which i guess means that whoever is the developer of the game being played can give instructions in the game software of where, size, and what resistance is to appear on the controller screen.

Am i understanding this correctly or am i getting it all wrong? And if i am understanding this correctly, does anyone have any idea how such a thing could be done?

 

[pc999]

Welcome.

And yes, it is more or less that.

 

[Seoman]

Ok, this is my crazy idea:

What if these "force feedback" were used to simulate the feel of buttons? You could basically give developpers endless choices and customization of the controller...

 

[SanGreal]

Yeah my friend pointed this info out on another messageboard...and pointed out how Immersion had suspiciously left Nintendo alone with its lawsuits...maybe they're in bed together? heh

Nintendo licensed their rubmle tech from Immersion, thats why they weren't sued

 

[one]

Isn't it the same technology as Sony's TouchEngine feedback technology which is another creation of Jun Rekimoto who happens to be in the other thread?

 

[Clashman]

I'm pretty sure that Nintendo's rumble technology is significantly different than Immersion's. I seem to remember a talk back in one of the lawsuit threads where someone mentioned that Immersion's controller involved moving the motors in a circular motion, while nintendo's involved moving it back and forth in a pendulum-like motion or something like that.

 

[Shark Sandwich]

Ok, this is my crazy idea:

What if these "force feedback" were used to simulate the feel of buttons? You could basically give developpers endless choices and customization of the controller...

Instead of just feeling the hard, unresponsive touchscreen surface, users perceive that buttons depress and release, just as physical buttons and switches do.

Whose crazy idea?

From what i do understand, it requires a screen to be placed over a touchscreen. And that screen can be manipulated into protruding certain areas to mimic a button which can be pressed with resistance to give the impression of it being a physical button.

Are you sure about that? That's what I thought when I read the headline, but after reading the whole thing, it looks like it just vibrates in a different way depending on where you press. This sounds like a neat idea, but I'm not sure how well it could actually simulate the feel of real buttons.

 

[Guden Oden]

I'm pretty sure that Nintendo's rumble technology is significantly different than Immersion's.

You've never opened up a rumblepack or GC pad, have you?

Hint: they look, and function exactly the same. Only difference is (and it's a very marginal one at that), Sony uses two motors with weights of different sizes. I can't believe this patent hasn't been trashed already into the junk it obviously is; off-center weights is not something new that should be patentable. It's nothing but bullshit, it's not even force feedback, or simulating force feedback. It just shakes; that's IT.

 

[London Geezer]

That's what i never got about the vibration thing on controllers...

It's not force feedback, it's not... Realistic.. It's just a vibrating thing... Never saw the point.

 

[j^aws]

Here's the patent which seems to describe this Immersion Touchsense tech,

Haptic feedback for touchpads and other touch controls

...
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

[0007] The present invention is directed to a haptic feedback planar touch control used to provide input to a computer system. The control can be a touchpad provided on a portable computer, or can be a touch screen found on a variety of devices. The haptic sensations output on the touch control enhance interactions and manipulations in a displayed graphical environment or when controlling an electronic device.

[0008] More specifically, the present invention relates to a haptic feedback touch control for inputting signals to a computer and for outputting forces to a user of the touch control. The control includes a touch input device including an approximately planar touch surface operative to input a position signal to a processor of said computer based on a location of user contact on the touch surface. The computer positions a cursor in a graphical environment displayed on a display device based at least in part on the position signal. At least one actuator is also coupled to the touch input device and outputs a force on the touch input device to provide a haptic sensation to the user contacting the touch surface. The actuator outputs the force based on force information output by the processor to the actuator.

[0009] The touch input device can be a touchpad separate from a display screen of the computer, or can be included in a display screen of the computer as a touch screen. The touch input device can be integrated in a housing of the computer or handheld device, or provided in a housing that is separate from the computer. The user contacts the touch surface with a finger, a stylus, or other object. The force is preferably a linear force output approximately perpendicularly to a plane of the touch surface of the touch input device, and the actuator can include a piezo-electric actuator, a voice coil actuator, a pager motor, a solenoid, or other type of actuator. In one embodiment, the actuator is coupled between the touch input device and a grounded surface. In another embodiment, the actuator is coupled to an inertial mass, wherein said actuator outputs an inertial force on the touch input device approximately along an axis perpendicular to the planar touch surface. A touch device microprocessor separate from the main processor of the computer can receive force information from the host computer and provide control signals based on the force information to control the actuator.

[0010] The haptic sensations, such as a pulse, vibration, or spatial texture, are preferably output in accordance with an interaction of a controlled cursor with a graphical object in the graphical environment. For example, a pulse can be output when the cursor is moved between menu elements in a menu, moved over said icon, or moved over a hyperlink. The touch input device can include multiple different regions, where at least one of the regions provides the position signal and at least one other region provides a signal that is used by the computer to control a different function, such as rate control function of a value or a button press. Different regions and borders between regions can be associated with different haptic sensations.

[0011] The present invention advantageously provides haptic feedback to a planar touch control device of a computer, such as a touchpad or touch screen. The haptic feedback can assist and inform the user of interactions and events within a graphical user interface or other environment and ease cursor targeting tasks. Furthermore, the invention allows portable computer devices having such touch controls to take advantage of existing haptic feedback enabled software. The haptic touch devices disclosed herein are also inexpensive, compact and consume low power, allowing them to be easily incorporated into a wide variety of portable and desktop computers and electronic devices.

[0012] These and other advantages of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon a reading of the following specification of the invention and a study of the several figures of the drawing.
...

Haptic feedback for touchpads and other touch controls

Isn't it the same technology as Sony's TouchEngine feedback technology which is another creation of Jun Rekimoto who happens to be in the other thread?

I can't access those documents without registering...any mirrors?