Ohmic-Sticker: Force-to-Motion Type Input Device that Extends Capacitive Touch Surface

We propose “Ohmic-Sticker,” a novel force-to-motion-type input device to extend capacitive touch surfaces. It realizes various types of force-sensitive inputs by simply attaching on to commercial touchpads or touchscreens (touch surfaces). A simple force-sensitive-resistor-based structure enables thin (less than 2 mm) form factors and battery-less operation. The applied force vector is detected as the leakage current from the corresponding touch surface electrodes by using the Ohmic-Touch [17] technology. Ohmic-Sticker can be used for adding force-sensitive interactions to touch surfaces, such as analog push buttons, TrackPoint-like devices, and full 6 DoF controllers for navigating virtual spaces. In this paper, we report a series of investigations on the design requirements of Ohmic-Sticker and some prototypes. We also evaluate the performance of Ohmic-Sticker as a pointing device.

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