Haptics controllers for natural interactions in VR

Overview

Virtual reality (VR) technologies have become cheaper and more accessible in the last couple of years. This allowed for exploring their use in different areas including gaming, health, education and training settings.

While VR can provide high immersion via augmenting our senses in the virtual environment, user interaction with the virtual environment has been limited relying on pre-set gestures or default controllers designed by the companies who built the VR gears.

The Vive Tracker is an accessory for HTC Vive which allows developers to bring real objects into the virtual world by tracking them in 3D space to correlate their interactions with in world items, e.g. sporting equipment, such as tennis racquets.

Research activities

In this project you'll develop interfaces between users and virtual reality environment using the Vive Tracker. This includes:

• designing and developing 3D printed controllers/low haptics to help contextualise how users interact with the virtual reality environment
• developing contextualised feedback mechanisms to enhance cognition, motivation and engagement
• programming a Raspberry Pi to connect the Vive Tracker to other programmable elements
• building a VR game using Unity where the existing/previously built low haptics controllers will be used to interact.

Outcomes

You'll produce:

• a literature review
• a haptic device consisting of 3D printed items and embedded electronics
• a demonstrated minimum viable prototype using Unity/Unreal game that uses the new device.

Skills and experience

We expect that students who do this project will have skills in:

• VR/AR interaction device development
• Raspberry Pi or Arduino programming.

Scholarships

You may be eligible to apply for a research scholarship.

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Contact

Contact the supervisor for more information.