# Visual Tactile Sensor Based Force Estimation for Position-Force Teleoperation

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2212.13007 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.13007/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 26 Dec 2022.

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [Evetac: An Event-based Optical Tactile Sensor for Robotic Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.01236/) (2023)
- [Learning Force Distribution Estimation for the GelSight Mini Optical Tactile Sensor Based on Finite Element Analysis](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.03315/) (2024)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Vision-based tactile sensors have gained extensive attention in the robotics community. The sensors are highly expected to be capable of extracting contact information i.e. haptic information during in-hand manipulation. This nature of tactile sensors makes them a perfect match for haptic feedback applications. In this paper, we propose a contact force estimation method using the vision-based tactile sensor DIGIT, and apply it to a position-force teleoperation architecture for force feedback. The force estimation is done by building a depth map for DIGIT gel surface deformation measurement and applying a regression algorithm on estimated depth data and ground truth force data to get the depth-force relationship. The experiment is performed by constructing a grasping force feedback system with a haptic device as a leader robot and a parallel robot gripper as a follower robot, where the DIGIT sensor is attached to the tip of the robot gripper to estimate the contact force. The preliminary results show the capability of using the low-cost vision-based sensor for force feedback applications.