Oculus Quest is a new headsets is developed by the technology company Oculus VR in 2019.
Specs, Pro, Cons for Oculus Quest:
The resolution of Quest is 1600 x 1440, but the rendering solution is around 3024 x 1680.
The refresh rate is 72Hz.
It is a wireless headset. Means Wi-fi connection is available.
It has touch controllers & remote control.
Quest has guesture tracking and eye tracking.
It can track 360° head movement.
It is capable with Android, IOS and Window phone.
It has USB port Type-C.
Oculus Link allows users to plug Quest to a laptop or pc to play VR experience. The cable for this Link & Quest will be coming out soon in the end of 2019. Although, Quest is less powerful comparing to Rift S, by plugging the Quest directly into a VR-ready PC with Oculus Link, it seems like it could be able to run more powerful VR experiences if Link works as promised.
This table shows the graphic cards that Link can support. (Lang, 2019)
Vive is a virtual reality headset, developed by a smartphone company branded HTC, and with the technology of a video game company branded Valve Corporation. It uses “room scale” tracking technology to allow users move in 3D environment and motion-tracked handheld controllers to interact with the game environment.
Specs & Value:
The minimum requirements of computer hardware in order to run smooth frame rates in games or experiences using a Vive are: GPU: NVIDIA GTX 970 or AMD R9 390, CPU: Intel i5-4590
The resolution of Vive is 2160 x 1200, but the rendering solution is around 3024 x 1680.
The refresh rate of Vive: 90Hz (90 FPS). This is the minimum frame rate, low frame rates will cause motion sickness.
Vive can track 360° head movement & gesture control.
Oculus Virtual Reality headsets is developed by an American technology company Oculus VR which was founded by Palmer Luckey, Brendan Iribe, Michael Antonov and Nate Mitchell in July 2012. The company also partnered with Samsung and developed Samsung Gear VR in 2015.
Specs, Pro, Cons for Oculus Go:
The resolution of Go is 2560 x 1440, but the rendering solution is around 3024 x 1680.
It is a wireless headset. Means Wi-fi connection is available.
It has touch controllers.
LCD display with 3 subpixels/px
Go has a battery level indicator. However, it is mentioned low battery life by users.
Go has no memory card slot like Vive.
Go has no position & 360° head movement tracking.
Specs, Pro, Cons for Oculus Rift:
The minimum requirements of computer hardware in order to run smooth frame rates in games or experiences using a Vive are: GPU: NVIDIA GTX 970 or AMD R9 390, CPU: Intel i5-4590
The refresh rate of Vive: 90Hz (90 FPS). This is the minimum frame rate, low frame rates will cause motion sickness.
Mixed Reality (MR), a predominantly virtual spaces where real-world objects or people are dynamically integrated into virtual worlds to build new environments and visualizations where physical and digital objects co-exist and interact in real-time (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
The concept of Mixed Reality was introduced by Paul Milgram and Fumio Kishino in 1994 (Microsoft, 2018; Reality Technologies, n.d.). It embraces all possible variations and compositions of real and virtual objects. The continuum ranges from a completely real environment to a completely virtual environment. (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
Mixed Reality Continuum Spectrum
Since Mixed Reality covers all possible variations and compositions of real and virtual objects and integrates the physical and digital worlds, both realities represent the polar ends of a spectrum known as the Mixed Reality Continuum / Virtual Continuum (Microsoft, 2018). It embraces all possible variations and compositions of real and virtual objects (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
(Microsoft HoloLens, 2016)
Two main types of devices deliver Mixed Reality experiences. Holographic devices place digital content in the real world as if it were there. Immersive devices create a sense of presence. They hide the physical world while replacing it with a digital experience (Microsoft, 2018).
Technological advancement, software enhancements and products have enabled Mixed Reality experiences today. Windows 10 provides a Mixed Reality platform for both device manufacturers and developers. Devices today can support a specific range within the Mixed Reality spectrum. In the future, new holographic devices will expand that range and become more immersive, and immersive devices will become more holographic (Microsoft, 2018; Reality Technologies, n.d.).
“Leap Motion is a new wireless controller which allows smart platforms to read motions,” says Taiwan’s AsusTeK Computer (Zielenziger, 2013).
Designing a game physics engines for human hands were not many. When you bring your hands into Virtual Reality, the results can be tense (Leap Motion, 2016).
Gripping and picking up an object is the fundamental element of the Interaction Engine (Leap Motion, 2016). Grabbing an object in your hand or pinching it makes you desperate to try the physics engine to keep your fingers out of it (Leap Motion, 2016).
By exploring the real-world and digital physics, Leap Motion is build for a more human experience, in which the user can grab or pick up an object. It can detect whether an object is being gripped (Leap Motion, 2016). When your fingers phase through the material, the object still feels real (Leap Motion, 2016).
Leap Motion also uses a secondary real-time physics representation of the hands to open up more subtle interactions (Leap Motion, 2016). With regular game physics, the object can throw from your hand and flies around the room easily and naturally (Leap Motion, 2016).
Virtual Reality (VR) is known as a realistic three-dimensional image or artificial environment that is created by the use of computer technology (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
The keys for ‘virtual’ and ‘reality’, virtual is near, and reality is what we experience as human beings. Virtual Reality means ‘near-reality’. It usually refers to a particular type of reality emulation that is presented to our senses, and we would feel as if we were really there (Virtual Reality Society, n.d.).
(Jacob, 2019)
How Does Virtual Reality Technology Work? Human uses senses and perception systems to understand the world (Virtual Reality Society, n.d.). A virtual environment in real-time should provide the appropriate responses as the person explores their surroundings (Virtual Reality Society, n.d.). A person becomes aware when they are in an artificial environment and adjusts their behaviour accordingly, which results in a theatrical, mechanical form of interaction (Virtual Reality Society, n.d.). Virtual Reality creates an exciting, interactive world for the user (Bardi, 2019).
Virtual Reality’s most immediately recognizable component is the head-mounted display (HMD). Display technology is often the most significant difference between immersive Virtual Reality systems and familiar user interfaces because human beings are visual creatures (Bardi, 2019).
Human beings react more quickly to audio waves than to visual cues. To create a powerful sense of presence to a virtual world, accurate environmental sounds and spatial characteristics are a must. Therefore, headphones are used (Bardi, 2019).
Besides that, to provide users with a realistic perception of their environment landscape, the Field of Vision (FOV) of Virtual Reality is measured based on the display degree of 360°. Most high-end headsets are made to do with 100° or 110° field of view, which is sufficient for most virtual reality content (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
(Jacob, 2019)
“Virtual Reality can be a tool to help people think about themselves and how they are relate to others, ” said Jeremy Bailenson, founding director of Sanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab and an adviser to MoFE (Ballentine, 2019).
Nowadays, Virtual Reality is used in games and entertainment (Metcalfe, 2018). It is also typical for aviation and military training (Bardi, 2019). By using virtual reality, officers are taught how to fly in battle, how to handle emergencies and recover quickly, and how to coordinate air support with ground operations (Reality Technologies, n.d.). These simulators provide trainees with intense levels of immersion since simulators often have visual acuity over the entire 360-degree field of view (Reality Technologies, n.d.). Police and soldiers can conduct virtual raids that avoid putting lives at risk (Bardi, 2019).
Other than above, Virtual Reality can help people to heal from mental illness, including post-traumatic stress disorder through therapy programs. Whether it’s allowing veterans to confront challenges in a controlled environment, or overcoming phobias in combination with behavioural therapy, it also helps people to reconcile and understand real-world experiences (Bardi, 2019).
Jacob. S. (2019, July 17). Lighting, human, person and silhouette: HD photo by Stella Jacob (@stella_jacob) on Unsplash. Retrieved from https://unsplash.com/photos/4lSz1Jv0Vkc
Augmented Reality (AR) is created by using computer technology to superimpose information such as sounds, images and text over a user’s view of the real-world (Emspak, 2018). The origin of the word augmented is ‘augment’, which means to increase, extend or enhance something (Fisher, 2019). It is a magnified version of reality where live direct or indirect views of physical, real-world environments (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
(The Official Pokémon YouTube channel, 2015)
Augmented Reality is rapidly growing in popularity. Augmented Reality applications can be as simple as a text-notification or as complex as an instruction on how to perform some life-threatening procedure (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
There are many applications driving Augmented Reality application development such as hand-phone applications and business applications by companies. They highlight a certain features, enhance understandings, and provide accessible and timely data to the users. There are many applications driving Augmented Reality application development such as hand-phone applications and business applications by companies (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
As you can see, phones and tablets are the way augmented reality gets into most people’s lives (Emspak, 2018). One of the application is called Vito Technology’s Star Walk app. It allows the user to use their tablet or phones’ camera to point at the sky. Thus, user will able to see the names of stars and planets on the image (Emspak, 2018).
Nick Cave’s iconic “Soundsuits” at Apple [AR]T Walk. [AR]T Augmented Reality Works is Leading Contemporary Artists, Curated in Partnership with the New Museum in New York (Apple, 2019)
There are several categories of Augmented Reality are exist nowadays such as Marker Based Augmented Reality, Markerless Augmented Reality, Projection Based Augmented Reality, and Superimposition Based Augmented Reality (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
Marker-based Augmented Reality is known as Image Recognition. It uses a camera on the device to distinguish a marker, such as a QR/2D code, serial numbers, or any other object from the real world to produce a result only when the marker is scanned by a reader (Reality Technologies, n.d.). Distinct, but simple patterns because they do not require a lot of processing power to read and can be recognized easily (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
The position and orientation are also calculated, in which some type of content and information has then overlayed the marker. Marker-based Augmented Reality is known as Image Recognition (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
Markerless Augmented Reality (location-based, position-based, or GPS Augmented Reality) is known as one of the most widely implemented applications of Augmented Reality. It uses a GPS, digital compass, velocity meter, or accelerometer, which is embedded in the device to provide data based on your location (Fisher, 2019). Markerless Augmented Reality technology is widely available for smartphones, and they even offer location detection features. Generally, it is used for mapping directions, finding nearby businesses, and other location-centric mobile applications (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
Projection-based Augmented Reality applications allow a user to interact by projecting artificial light onto a real-world surface and then detect the user’s interaction, for example, touching of that projected light. User’s interaction detection can be done by differentiating between an expected projection and the altered projection. Another interesting application of Projection-based Augmented Reality utilizes laser-plasma technology to project a three-dimensional (3D) interactive hologram into mid-air (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
Superimposition-based Augmented Reality is either partially or fully replaces the original view of an object with a newly augmented view. Object recognition plays a vital role in Superimposition-based Augmented Reality because the application cannot replace the original look with an augmented if it cannot determine what the object is (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
One of the persuasive consumer-facing examples of Superimposition-based Augmented Reality is Ikea Augmented Reality furniture catalogue. Users will need to download an application. By scanning selected pages in their catalogue, users can place virtual Ikea furniture in their own home with the help of augmented reality (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
Most Augmented Reality applications are often self-contained. They do not need a cable or desktop computer to function, unlike the Oculus Rift or HTC Vive VR headsets (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
The key components to Augmented Reality Devices are sensors, cameras, projection, processing unit, and reflection of optics lenses (Reality Technologies, n.d.).
The Official Pokémon YouTube channel. (2015, September 09). Discover Pokémon in the Real World with Pokémon GO! Video retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sj2iQyBTQs
I would like to learn more about Unity and Unreal Engine. I would like to discover the world of 3D in Virtual Reality. I choose these engines because they produce AAA quality graphic, bring in a more realistic experience inside Virtual Reality.
Unity is one of a engine that I am always interested in. One of the reason is because most of my favourite game; Ori in the Blind Forest, Devotion are created by using Unity.
Unity uses C# coding language. Which is easier to learn for a beginner. Therefore, I would like to learn Unity and put it as path before I stepping into learning the Unreal Engine which uses coding C++ language. It is a lot harder to build up the documentation but Unreal Engine has a feature of Blueprint. To make it easier for a person like me, I can link the script, it will auto create a full sentence coding which still can function the event of what I want it to be.
Besides this two engines, I would like to explore more engines such as Sketch Up and Tvori. If, I can download Tvori for free. Tvori is quite an amazing engine to create VR. It is creating Virtual Reality inside a Virtual World. Basically, the creator wear her Oculus and create a world inside the Virtual Reality using available assets or by drawing 3d objects.
Sketch Up has a quite realistic look and easy to control the light and dark in ambience around. Also, it is one of the export plug in to Unreal Engine.
Research & Development in DM 