H-Studio: an authoring tool for adding haptic and motion effects to audiovisual content

Abstract

Haptic and motion effects have been widely used for virtual reality applications in order to provide a physical feedback from the virtual world. Such feedback was recently studied to improve the user experience in audiovisual entertainment applications. But the creation of haptic and motion effects is a main issue and requires dedicated editing tool. This paper describes a user-friendly authoring tool to create and synchronize such effects with audiovisual content. More precisely we focus on the edition of motion effects. Authoring is simplified thanks to a dedicated graphical user interface, allowing either to import external data or to synthesize effects thanks to a force-feedback device. Another key feature of this editor is the playback function which enables to preview the motion effect. Hence this new tool allows non expert users to create immersive haptic-audiovisual experiences.