Hapmosphere: Simulating the Weathers for Walking Around in Immersive Environment with Haptics Feedback

With the advance of locomotion techniques and virtual reality head-mount display (VR-HMD), the users can explore the virtual world by moving around in the virtual environment. Although VR-HMD can provide immersive visual and auditory feedback, without haptic technologies, the users cannot perceive the multiple tactile sensations from the virtual environment. In this paper, we present Hapmosphere, a multiple tactile display for simulating weather in the immersive environment, which can provide thermal, wind, and humidity feedback simultaneously in a room-scale space. This system consists of a steerable structure and haptic modules rigged on the ceiling, so the users can walk around in the physical area. Furthermore, to evaluate the ability of the tactile display, we propose seven kinds of weathers via design consideration and conduct a user study to investigate the feasibility. In our study, the result has shown the potential of utilizing this haptic technique to enhance the immersive experience. Finally, we highlight the limitations and challenges of designing an immersive environment with haptic feedback.