Dual Mode Fingertip Guiding Manipulator for Blind Persons Enabling Passive/Active Line-Drawing Explorations

A fingertip guiding manipulator was developed as a haptic graphic display to help the visually impaired create mental images of line drawings. The latest model to be presented in this study equips dual mode fingertip-guiding function allowing either passive or active exploration. When using this manipulator, the person is assumed to pinch a knob by his/her fingertip: the knob is attached at the end of the manipulator. In the active mode, the fingertip guiding manipulator pulls his/her fingertip along line drawings. In the passive mode, it provides a kind of selective compliance, and allows the persons freely to move his/her fingertip in the only direction of the line drawings. For the sake of the dual mode function, it is expected that efficiency would be improved a lot comparing to the former model being equipped with the passive mode alone.