Disney Made a Haptic Force Jacket

Virtual reality is gradually improving as better headsets hit the market, the PCs powering them become wearable, and handheld sensors allow for enhanced interactions. But there's still a long way to go before we achieve a fully-immersive experience. Disney may have the next piece of that puzzle in the form of a haptic force jacket.

Disney Research, Carnegie Mellon University, and MIT collaborated to create this new jacket which allows for physical feedback during an immersive experience such as virtual reality. The jacket consists of an array of 26 pneumatically-actuated airbags and force sensors. When combined, they allow for "precisely directed force and high-frequency vibrations" to be felt across the upper body of the wearer.

There's a haptic effects editor which can be used to control the inflation speed, force, and duration. This can be combined with a motion interface allowing a path of inflation and deflation to be mapped. That in turn allows the wearer to feel movement across their upper body. For example, if the hand of a virtual person moved across your chest, the jacket could realistically simulate that touch and movement.

Working with users, it was possible to create 14 different feel effects. Using those parameters, Disney managed to recreate the feeling of a snake crawling around your body and a snowball hitting you. You can even feel like your upper body has suddenly grown very muscular.

For now, the jacket remains a prototype, but one that already looks set to potentially revolutionize how we "feel" in virtual reality. There's also nothing to stop the same system from being reconfigured as a pair of trousers. Yes, haptic force pants could be a thing one day!

About Matthew Humphries

Senior Editor

I started working at PCMag in November 2016, covering all areas of technology and video game news. Before that I spent nearly 15 years working at Geek.com as a writer and editor. I also spent the first six years after leaving university as a professional game designer working with Disney, Games Workshop, 20th Century Fox, and Vivendi.

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