New Delhi: Meta, formerly Facebook, has taken another step to show how serious it is about augmented reality and virtual reality, the company has unveiled a prototype wearable that mimics the feeling of handling real objects in the virtual world.
After quietly working on it for almost seven years, Meta Reality Labs is now ready with a prototype of a haptic glove that reproduces sensations like grasping an object or running your hand along a surface.
According to Sean Keller, director of research science at Meta Reality Labs and Michael Abrash, chief scientist at Meta Reality Labs, the haptic glove has been in the work for years and it may take several years to be released to the public. However, it is now a part of the big AR/VR picture for Meta, one where sight and sound and touch fuse together to make an augmented digital world more realistic.
The haptic glove prototype is lined with around 15 ridged and inflatable bladder pads called actuators that are arranged to fit along the wearer’s palm, the underside of their fingers and their fingertips. The back features small white markers that let cameras track how the fingers move through space and has got internal sensors that capture how the wearer’s fingers are bending.
Meanwhile, earlier this month, Facebook debuted its first brand campaign post rebranding to Meta. The first advertisement from the firm shows a classic painting that celebrates the possibilities of the metaverse as the battle in this space heats up. A group of friends is seen looking at some classic 2D paintings and one of them, with a tiger preying on a buffalo illustrates Meta's ambitious goals and also highlights the possibilities of virtual experiences and the metaverse.