Haptics Tech Consumers Are Missing Out On
Insights from Delft University’s Yasemin Vardar on all the fun haptics tech.
Today, haptics aka tactile feedback is used in games, user interfaces, online shopping, tele-touch, data visualization, art appreciation, and an aid for the blind.
Beyond the haptic motors you find in your phone and gaming controller, haptics come in many other forms, including wearables, surfaces, pin-arrays, mid-air, and tool-based.
That said, many people have only experienced vibration haptics. Like what you’ll find embedded in an Apple iPhone, Sony Playstation or Quest 2 controller. What else is out there and how can it make the world more immersive?
Related Haptics Club Chat
We explored this on Thursday, October 21, 2021, at 12:00 pm EST on Twitter Spaces with Yasemin Vardar, Assistant Professor in Cognitive Robotics at Delft University. Before Delft, Yasemin was a Post Doctoral Researcher at the Haptic Intelligence Department of the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems and also earned her Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering. Her enthusiasm for haptics is truly awe-inspiring!
This post is also based on one of Yasemin’s recent talks on haptic effects in consumer technologies.
Sometimes Haptics Feel Like Magic
There are many ways to achieve haptic effects. From simple vibrations, shape-changing, electrostatic, ultrasonic waves, electrical, thermal, and even pseudo haptics.
Pseudo-haptics may sound complicated, but it’s certainly not rocket science. If anything, it’s more of an art. The illusion of haptics can be created by changing the shape of a mouse cursor (like a small circle into a bigger circle), which gives the impression of physical engagement. By accelerating and decelerating a cursor, it gives off the impression of texture. Add sound, and your brain becomes even more convinced!
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Hot, Cold, Fuzzy, and Soft
Magic aside, what other types of haptics and their effects are available today.
📳 Vibration — the most common. Used in phones and gaming controllers to convey everything from confirming actions (like pressing a button) to expressing textures.
🔥 Thermal stimulation — thermal haptics are able to heat and cool very quickly. Imagine a video of a fireplace, and the closer your finger gets to the fire, the warner your finger feels.
⚡ Electrical stimulation — using a current to stimulate the neurons in your fingers. If this scares you, just know electricity is a foundational part of the haptic industry.
🔴 Shape changing — use things like electroactive polymers to change the geometry of a surface. There are also versions with liquid and air. Imagine a balloon and how different it feels inflated vs deflated. There are also haptic pin arrays, which are like the pin impression toy many of us used to play with as kids.
✈️ Ultrasonic — it uses, you guessed it, ultrasonic frequencies. This can decrease the friction of your finger on a screen. It has been used to replicate side touch buttons and texture effects on surfaces.
✨ Electrostatic — a friction-based haptic like ultrasonic, however, it increases friction. For example, the electrostatic force can modulate the apparent slipperiness of a glass touchscreen.
Feel All The Things!
Just imagine how different your phone, gaming, tablet, car, and shopping experience would be if one or more of these technologies were embedded.
Future of gaming — my phone warms up when I charge my laser pulse weapon and it gets super cold when my character walks outside in the snow.
To stay on top of cool haptics tech, be sure to join the All Things Haptics Newsletter and check out the Haptics Club on Twitter and listen to previous podcasts here.
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