Apple's VR headset and Apple Glass smart glasses may be controlled by the Digital Crown on the Apple Watch and AirPods Max

This can be inferred from a new Apple patent pointed out by Patently Apple, which shows how the Digital Crown could be used to easily control features such as zoom in Apple's much-rumored mixed reality and augmented reality headsets

While it sounds like a neat way to control VR and MR headsets and smart glasses, a particularly interesting feature here is the haptics that Apple proposes to put into such "Crown inputs"

"The crown module may further include a feedback system that provides local haptic feedback to the crown," the patent explains" The haptic feedback can be effectively perceived by the user at the crown without the entire head-mountable device vibrating against the user's head and/or face"

Such a system could allow for more haptic control Given our experience with control-integrated VR headsets, having controls that provide a form of feedback that allows for initiated control when the device being controlled cannot actually be seen would be welcome For example, touch screens on VR headsets can be a bit difficult to get used to

According to the patent, this tactile feedback can be varied so that the wearer of the MR headset or AR glasses can get clear feedback on the details of when to start and stop interacting with something For example, one vibration could signal the start of zooming in on augmented reality map data, while another could signal that the maximum practical zoom boundary has been reached

The Haptic Digital Crown System patent somewhat describes an idealized MR and AR headset experience where various sensors, combined with audio and visual feedback, allow for better control and response from the wearable device

"Other user sensors can perform facial feature detection, facial motion detection, facial recognition, eye tracking, user mood detection, user emotion detection, and voice detection," the patent states

Patents often describe feature-rich devices or concepts that, when they become reality, are not as well equipped as first envisioned

And Cupertino could do this for MR headsets and Apple Glass But all we have are leaks, rumors, and speculation, so it may take a little longer for the ideas detailed in Apple's patent to become reality