Immersive Virtual Environments and Multisensory Interfaces: The Erotogod Experiment

Based on my work with virtual environments dating back to the early 1990s, and with practical and engineering limitations on building tactile bodysuits that enhance the sense of immersion within detailed and dynamic virtual worlds overcome, this paper will take as its subject the example of my immersive artwork the Erotogod experiment (2001). A key aspect of interaction and immersion for the participant was the use of tactile bodysuit. I will analyze the multisensory nature of this experience, how tactility was engendered and, in fact, engineered through a mixture of technologies and approaches.
The paper will focus on the multisensory aspect of my interfaces as they have evolved through my projects, discussing how engineering problems were overcome to enhance tactility, the experimentations with tactile technologies in order to engineer the right feeling, and what is involved in the multisensory engineering of the experience of tactility for the participant. I am therefore addressing the issue of how to employ tactile interaction from the perspective of both practitioner and artist.