30 August 2012

A Cooking Simulator That Helps Aspiring Chefs Become Better Cooks

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Researchers at the Tokyo Institute of Technology have developed an augmented-reality cooking simulator that will help aspiring chefs become better cooks.



The simulator features a ‘force feedback’ frypan and spatula that accurately recreates the sense of cooking in a kitchen.



With its 3D interface, virtual ingredients are projected on to the frypan, which users can move and stir.



When users interact with the frypan, the virtually-projected food would change color based on ‘heat’ calculated by the simulator.



The simulator even mimics the weight of the ingredients, allowing users to get a feel of cooking without the use of any actual ingredients.



According to the researchers, the technology combines a ‘rigid-body physics engine library and a heat-conduction simulator’ that are able to calculate the amount of moisture being evaporated and the temperature when cooking.



It shows the meat turning color from red to brown, and the vegetables turning dark, as they are cooked—simulating cooking in real life.



“We’d like to develop this system further, so it’s helpful in actual cooking at home. It could help you make the meat you’re cooking taste even better,” Fumihiro Kato of Hasegawa Lab, Tokyo Institute of Technology, told DigInfo TV.



“If it could be linked to a system that tells you, 'In five minutes, your food will look like this, and in ten minutes, it will look like this. Which would you prefer?', so this system could really help with cooking.”





























[via Diginfo TV]