Virtual Simulation of Cultural Heritage Works Using Haptic Interaction

This paper presents a virtual reality framework for the modeling and interactive simulation of cultural heritage works with the use of advanced human computer interaction technologies. A novel algorithm is introduced for realistic real-time haptic rendering that is based on an efficient collision detection scheme. Smart software agents assist the user in manipulating the smart objects in the environment, while haptic devices are utilized to simulate the sense of touch. Moreover, the virtual hand that simulates the user's hand is modeled using analytical implicit surfaces so as to further increase the speed of the simulation and the fidelity of the force feedback. The framework has been tested with several ancient technology works and has been evaluated with visitors of the Science Center and Technology Museum of Thessaloniki.