We show that electrical stimulation on the human tongue amplifies the taste sensation of carbonated beverages. We have developed a novel electric taste system with two components: a cup-shaped device and its circuit for stimulation. The cup-shaped device has a double-layer structure. The circuit has a constant current control circuit and a signal generator, which allow adjustment of the electrical parameters. The device is hygiene when we demonstrate electric taste because the device has two-layered. Thus we can change the inner layer that touches the user’s mouth. The device is also inexpensive and easy to manufacture so that many people can experience them.

In this paper, we present an Augmented Reality (AR) system for video see-through Head Mounted Displays (HMD) which implements natural physical interaction between augmented virtual balls (which represent real balls) and real world objects. We measure the coefficient of restitution (COR) between real balls and real objects in the environment and use the corresponding COR when the virtual ball collides with a real world object. Experiment result show that subjects prefer the physical behavior of augmented balls using our method over the physical behavior using fixed COR.

The system described in this paper provides a real-time 3D visual experience by using an array of 64 video cameras and an integral photography display with 60 viewing directions. The live 3D scene in front of the camera array is reproduced by the full-color, full-parallax autostereoscopic display with interactive control of viewing parameters. The main technical challenge is fast and flexible conversion of the data from the 64 multicamera images to the integral photography format. Based on image-based rendering techniques, our conversion method first renders 60 novel images corresponding to the viewing directions of the display, and then arranges the rendered pixels to produce an integral photography image. For real-time processing on a single PC, all the conversion processes are implemented on a GPU with GPGPU techniques. The conversion method also allows a user to interactively control viewing parameters of the displayed image for reproducing the dynamic 3D scene with desirable parameters. This control is performed as a software process, without reconfiguring the hardware system, by changing the rendering parameters such as the convergence point of the rendering cameras and the interval between the viewpoints of the rendering cameras.

In order to classify tree types, we introduce a new technique, which detects the change of Polarimetric Entropy parameters. We define the difference of the two-dimensional polarimetric entropy parameters, and applied the proposed technique to Pi-SAR airborne polarimetric SAR data. The result in an urban area shows that the seasonal change is very random and we could not find significant changes between two scenes. Then, we applied the technique in a forested region. The change in coniferous trees and broadleaf trees is statistically different. Using the change in polarimetric entropy properties, we find this technique can be used for tree type classification.

We introduce a new environment to make and play interactive contents with more than video game quality. The system consists of a projector array, a viewer and an editor for the special contents. The projector array projects multiple digital images seamlessly both in time and space, thus a very high quality video projection system. The viewer features a function to composite a passive video and interactive CG in real time. The editor is a high-end non-linear editing system combined with some new plug-in software to pre-compute the information necessary for real-time compositing. A new method of digital image recognition assisted by human operators is used. Unlike general purpose computer vision algorithms, it minimizes the error of 3D estimation at the compositing position. We call this approach V2R or the video-based virtual reality. It allows the operator to experience interactive communications with objects in a very high quality video.