Woojer unveils haptic vest for VR
Fri 23 Sep 2016
Haptic company Woojer has unveiled the Vest, a new consumer wearable that offers an innovative technique for virtual reality gaming immersion that can also be used to enhance music and movie viewing experiences.
Available for viewing at this month’s Tokyo game show, the Woojer Vest incorporates six haptic transducers located on six meridian points on the user’s torso. Four are located on the chest, and two on the spine. The transducers can play back sounds in the range of 0-500 Hz directly to the meridian points, which the wearer feels as a specific impact on that location. The haptic vest immerses the user more fully into a virtual gaming experience.
The Woojer Vest can also be used to listen to music. Users can transmit sounds from music files to the vest, adding a tactile dimension to the musical experience. And if worn while watching movies, it can replicate the big-screen bass rumble previously experienced only in theaters.
Woojer also announced that it would be releasing a developer’s kit for the Woojer Vest. The SDK will allow developers access to over 400 sounds they can use to create their own applications for the Vest.
This principle is demonstrated in the company’s previous offering, the Woojer. Basically a small but powerful subwoofer, the original Woojer wearable is a portable bass transducer with three different levels of intensity that could be used for listening to music or for gaming. The original Woojer device was a successful Kickstarter project from 2013, which went into production less than one year from its kickoff.
Woojer is an angel investor-backed private company based in Israel and New York. In an interview regarding the Woojer bass transducer, founder and CEO Kfir Bar Levav said, “Headphones alone cannot deliver the sensation of high-energy acoustics, and especially as more media moves to mobile, many users crank up the volume to try to emulate that intense feeling. We set out to make a portable, affordable device that could duplicate that rich experience – it is Woojer’s multisensory effect that makes users feel like they’re right in the action.”
The same multisensory effect is the theory behind the Woojer Vest.
The Woojer Vest is compatible with Xbox, PlayStation, Wii, Oculus and Vive systems. While it is not currently available for purchase, and pricing information has not yet been released, visitors to the company website can score 30% off when the product is made available for sale.
