The first pre-orders for the Apple Vision Pro will be hitting users’ hands very soon, but it appears Apple is making plans to make headsets like the Vision Pro respond to the posture of the person wearing them.
A new published patent (through Clearly apple) refers to ‘layered posture awareness’ – a method that allows headsets and smart specs to figure out users’ posture and then make the necessary adjustments to the way content is presented.
For example, a 3D virtual environment can be slightly adjusted based on the way the user is standing or sitting, and the surround sound effects applied to audio feeds can also be changed to be as immersive as possible.
The patent also states that calculations must be made based on the pressure the headset can exert on the person wearing it. This information can be used to warn users if their posture is putting too much strain on their body parts.
Future updates
It’s a pretty complex patent, and the usual caveats about patents apply here too: there’s no guarantee that these ideas will ever actually be implemented into a product, but they provide an interesting insight into what Apple’s engineers are thinking about.
In the hands-on time we had with the Apple Vision Pro, we didn’t notice any kind of head or neck strain, although these sessions were quite short. We will conduct a full test of the spatial computing device as soon as we are able to do so.
Something described in the patent could possibly be delivered to the Vision Pro via a future software update. Alternatively, it could be delayed for future versions of the headset, which we’re already hearing rumors about.
Apple also hopes that more app developers will release special versions of their apps for the Vision Pro in the future: companies like Netflix are currently holding back because it will take a while for the Vision Pro to become mainstream.