Immersive home-fitness solution using muscle-based haptic wearables

瓦尔基里工业公司正在开发一种新的沉浸式家庭健身解决方案，使用基于肌肉的触觉可穿戴设备。通过利用我们在电肌肉刺激（EMS）方面的专利和虚拟现实（VR）内容创作方面的经验，我们将提供一个系统，为人们的家庭带来高效、个性化和引人入胜的健身程序。设计基金会的拨款将使我们能够进行深入的客户研究，包括以人为本的低成本原型体验设计，与利益相关者的接触，以及用户体验和商业可行性研究。该项目属于跨部门沉浸式项目设计，将沉浸式技术，触觉和VR游戏应用于健身和医疗保健。在与重工业合作伙伴合作后，瓦尔基里工业公司现在将注意力集中在健身市场上。我们的专利技术可以通过在VR中应用EMS来感知肌肉的重量和阻力。最近，VR成为家庭健身的热门目的地，Beat Saber和FitXR等游戏的收入达到了数千万美元。此外，EMS设备（如Slendertone或Sixpad）已被专业和业余运动员广泛使用，近年来，人们对EMS的兴趣日益浓厚。我们将结合EMS对肌肉训练和恢复的效率与游戏化的VR例程建基于我们在VR和触觉方面的经验。设计基金会的拨款将使我们能够了解健身用户的动机，测试我们的市场并验证假设，创建各种简单的原型并与客户进行测试。我们将使用双钻石设计过程来接近使用VR和触觉健身的想法。我们将：发现：与健身教练和健身爱好者一起举办研讨会，了解他们对内部健身房体验的偏好。我们将了解不同的训练制度，不同的肌肉群是如何训练的，等等。定义哪些练习可以移植到VR头显上。根据利益相关者的访谈，我们将制定产品需求，软硬件系统的特点，系统的社交方面等。使用我们专有的可穿戴触觉技术开发简单的沉浸式游戏原型，并将其应用于不同的肌肉群。我们将创造2-4种不同的简单体验。交付：在Here East与我们的焦点小组和利益相关者一起测试这些原型，评估我们技术的效率和参与度。到项目结束时，我们将了解我们应该在进一步的研发方向，使产品更接近市场。

Valkyrie Industries is developing a new immersive home-fitness solution using muscle-based haptic wearables. By exploiting our patent in electro-musclular stimulation (EMS) and experience in virtual reality (VR) content creation, we will deliver a system that brings efficient, personalised and engaging fitness routines to people's homes. The design foundations grant will allow us to carry out in-depth customer research, including a human-centered design of low-cost prototype experiences, engagement with stakeholders, and both user-experience and commercial feasibility research. This project falls under the Design for Cross Sector Immersive Projects, applying immersive technologies, haptics and VR gaming, to fitness and healthcare.Valkyrie Industries, after working with heavy-industry partners, is now focusing its attention on the fitness market. Our patented technology allows sensations of weight and resistance in muscles by applying EMS in VR. Recently, VR became a popular destination for home fitness, with games such as Beat Saber and FitXR reaching revenues in the tens of millions of dollars. Additionally, EMS devices such as Slendertone or Sixpad have been extensively used by both professional and amateur athletes, with a renewed interest growing in recent years. We will combine the efficiency of EMS for muscle training and recovery with gamified VR routines, building upon our experience in VR and haptics.The design foundations grant will allow us to understand the motivations of the fitness users, test our market and validate hypotheses, create various simple prototypes and test them with customers. We will use the double-diamond design process to approach the idea of using VR and haptics for fitness. We will:Discover: run workshops with fitness instructors and gym-goers to understand their preferences for the in-house gym experiences. We will understand different training regimes, how different muscle groups are trained etc.Define which exercises can be potentially ported to VR headsets. Based on the stakeholders' interviews, we will formulate the product requirements, the features of the software and hardware systems, the social aspect of the system etc.Develop simple immersive game prototypes using our proprietary wearable haptic technology, and apply it to different muscle groups. We will create 2-4 different simple experiencesDeliver: test those prototypes with our focus groups and stakeholders at Here East, gauging the efficiency and engagement of our technology. By the end of the project, we will understand which direction we should take in our further R&D to bring the product closer to market.