Tactile Communication

Goal-

Bring people closer by engaging another sensory element in the digital world

Concept-

I’m sitting in my Freshman dorm in Providence RI. My parents are at home in Shanghai. We each have an animatronic robot hand and a glove embedded with flex sensors. My glove controls the robot hand over in Shanghai and my parents’ glove controls the robot hand in my dorm. Not only can I see and hear my parents, I can also touch them.

This grew out of a robot finger project that I was working on before entering college(see video). I developed several iterations of robot hands that were 3D printed and connected to the web through an Arduino wifi module. Each finger has full range of motion and are powered by individual servos and wire tendons.