Flexible Rod Shape Displays

Wing-Sum Law, Sofia Wyetzner, and Sean Follmer | In Preparation

Timelapse of robotic gridshell moving between curved surfaces.

Shape displays are a type of tangible user interface that can generate multiple physical forms in a reconfigurable manner. In this work we detail the design and actuation of flexible rod shape displays – a novel type of tangible user interface. The smoothness, high compliance, and easy manipulability of flexible rods make them a promising medium for expressing high curvature shapes – a task with which many existing shape displays struggle.

I'll update this when we publish!