Virtual Reality is amazing. You can stand in the middle of the scene and feel completely immersed, panoramic style. VR Apps and Games are doing great in producing the ultimate visual effects to make you believe that you have teleported to some new world. However, the story doesn’t end there. The next phase in VR is all about the sense of touch.
Once you are in this beautiful computer generated scene there is a natural urge to interact with the objects. However this immersive experience is immediately hampered if you don’t feal the sense of touch. Because this is what makes the user a participant instead of just being a spectator in the virtual reality world.
Most of the virtual reality devices offer users the visual experience but when it comes to interaction with the objects their controllers are not clearly up to the mark. Now that for total immersion in virtual worlds we need to use our hands, and that is what companies like MANUS VR are trying to enable us with their VR gloves for our hands and arm tracking.
Manus VR is based on the Lighthouse integration i.e. strapping a SteamVR controller to the arms of the player. It helps in positional tracking which is fused with input from each finger to provide the user a life like sensation of touch. Check this embedded video and notice how the player grabs objects, passes them from hand to hand, all pretty seamlessly.
MANUS VR has teamed up with HTC and are in plans to create a bracelet with Vive’s sensors. This means that the entire sleeve with sensors as you can see from the video will soon get replaced with some fancy tech.
However, the final device must also make sure it features the greatest tracking accuracy. The arm tracking device may take some time before it ships, considering it is still in the experimental phase. The team is reportedly planning to release the open SDK for developers this December.
Though when it will reach the consumers is a question whenever it happens, you could take for granted a much better VR experience.This will mean that unlike Dexmo VR Gloves, both your fingers and arms will play their part in the vitual environment.
For more information: Manus VR