There are completely different ranges of immersion that include being a drone pilot. For starters, it’s fairly one thing to have the ability to pilot one thing from the bottom with a monitor in entrance of you displaying your progress.
After that, FPV goggles take issues to the following degree. Putting on a pair of respectable goggles is like diving into the cockpit of your drone. You get a real hen’s eye view.
But one factor lacking from the overall immersion expertise is the best way the drone is managed. Despite the entire realism that comes with FPV, you continue to find yourself flying by your thumbs. As people can’t really fly, we do not know what these controlling actions ought to be like, however there should be one thing higher than thumbs, proper?
At least that’s the considering behind FlyJacket.
A group from Swiss analysis institute École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) has developed wearable jacket for pilots to regulate their fixed-wing drones. Instead of thumbs and sticks, customers depend on extra intuitive and cozy actions with their complete our bodies.
The FlyJacket is actually an exoskeleton that represents the completely different elements of the drone. As the wearer, all you need to do it placed on the jacket, faux your arms are the drone’s wings and transfer your physique accordingly. Pitching or rolling your physique will lead the drone to make the identical corresponding motion. Combined with FPV goggles, that is flying for actual.
“The experience starts when you put the FlyJacket on as it gives the feeling of wearing a superhero suit,” mentioned EPFL’s Carine Rognon. As the drone management could be very intuitive, consumer is immediately immersed into the flight and may immediately begin to discover the setting. You nearly immediately turn into embodied to the drone”.
The instinct of flight
The FlyJacket was developed at EPFL’s Laboratory of Intelligent Systems. The group was led by Professor Dario Floreano, who claims that the exosuit isn’t actually one thing pilots have to coach arduous to make use of.
That’s as a result of it’s so intuitive. Long earlier than we ever obtained our arms on management pads, we pretended that our arms have been wings and that we might fly. According to the group, the system is snug for novices for that purpose and advantageous for long-term use as a result of it offloads the burden of your outstretched arms utilizing helps related to the hips.
The jacket works by utilizing sensors in to detect physique movement, which is then translated into pitch and roll.
An answer to movement illness?
In the accompanying analysis paper, the group means that the machine could possibly be used to assist FPV pilots fighting movement illness.
“Participants reported in the questionnaire significantly less physical discomfort using the FlyJacket than the remote controller. This difference is caused by a higher level of dizziness felt when flying using the remote controller. We hypothesize that, as the participant’s body stays static when using the remote controller, the sensation of motion sickness due to the virtual reality goggles is intensified,” it mentioned.
However ridiculous you would possibly look whereas carrying a full-on hen go well with to fly your drone, you’ll be able to’t argue that it’s not an fascinating concept.
You can learn extra in regards to the undertaking within the group’s analysis paper.
