What I grasp is what I control: interacting through grasp releases

Abstract

The idea of capitalizing on the hand's degrees of freedom while grasping for gesture-based control motivates my research. The question is: to what extent can users interact with grasped objects through tiny finger gestures that are performed whilst grasping? This extended abstract is a position paper on developing a paradigm for interacting with everyday objects. I focus on designing ergonomic microinteractions and interfaces regarding human motor abilities, interaction preferences, and the understanding of the users themselves within their environment. The basis of the investigated interaction designs is a taxonomy for microgestures that is developed in an expert study. In proof-of-concept user studies with interactive prototypes, I evaluate microgesture-based interactions and generalize them to a post WIMP paradigm for interacting with grasped objects. The paradigm contains design implications for occluded gestures relying on embodied knowledge about grasping objects.