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Physics-based sound synthesis represents a promising paradigm for the design of a veridical and effective continuous feedback in augmented everyday contexts. In this paper, we introduce the Sound Design Toolkit (SDT), a software package available as a complete front-end application, providing a palette of virtual lutheries and foley pits, that can be exploited in sonic interaction design research and education. In particular, the package includes polyphonic features and connectivity to multiple external devices and sensors in order to facilitate the embedding of sonic attributes in interactive artifacts. The present release represents an initial version towards an effective and usable tool for sonic interaction designers.

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A tool for the multisensory stylus-based exploration of virtual textures was used to investigate how different feedback modalities (static or dynamically deformed images, vibration, sound) affect exploratory gestures. To this end, we ran an experiment where participants had to steer a path with the stylus through a curved corridor on the surface of a graphic tablet/display, and we measured steering time, dispersion of trajectories, and applied force. Despite the variety of subjective impressions elicited by the different feedback conditions, we found that only nonvisual feedback induced significant variations in trajectories and an increase in movement time. In a post-experiment, using a paper-and-wood physical realization of the same texture, we recorded a variety of gestural behaviors markedly different from those found with the virtual texture. With the physical setup, movement time was shorter and texture-dependent lateral accelerations could be observed. This work highlights the limits of multisensory pseudo-haptic techniques in the exploration of surface textures

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