Forum Discussion
The Opposite of Augmented Reality - Keyboards in VR
I'm posting this from my blog http://news.jespionage.com/2014/01/whats-opposite-of-augmented-reality-and.html because I think more people here will find this useful.
Hi all
I'd like to talk about something I'm calling "Thin Reality." I've also been tempted to call it "Submented Reality" just because of how terrible it sounds There might be another name, but these will have to do for this article.
What I'm talking about is displaying a thin layer of reality in a VR environment. This is unlike Augmented Reality which displays a thin layer of the virtual in real-reality.
A company called Sixense makes magnetic positional sensors - the Hydra and the upcoming STEM system. These devices allow you to detect the position and orientation of an object. Most people are planning to use these to determine the position and orientation of the player's hands or a prop such as a sword or gun.
Imagine attaching a STEM sensor to your keyboard instead of your hand. Then in your game you could ask the game for help locating your keyboard. A transparent glowing model of your keyboard could then appear inside your virtual world, but in it's real world location relative to your eyes. You could then instinctively reach out and place your hands on your keyboard without removing your Oculus Rift.
This could be done for your mouse, keyboard, controllers, headphones, cell phone or even your coffee mug; anything you might have cause to reach for during a play session. It might seem to break immersion to have this out-of-game object appear in your carefully crafted virtual world but it wouldn't be as bad as removing your Rift every time you want a caffeine fix.
Hi all
I'd like to talk about something I'm calling "Thin Reality." I've also been tempted to call it "Submented Reality" just because of how terrible it sounds There might be another name, but these will have to do for this article.
What I'm talking about is displaying a thin layer of reality in a VR environment. This is unlike Augmented Reality which displays a thin layer of the virtual in real-reality.
A company called Sixense makes magnetic positional sensors - the Hydra and the upcoming STEM system. These devices allow you to detect the position and orientation of an object. Most people are planning to use these to determine the position and orientation of the player's hands or a prop such as a sword or gun.
Imagine attaching a STEM sensor to your keyboard instead of your hand. Then in your game you could ask the game for help locating your keyboard. A transparent glowing model of your keyboard could then appear inside your virtual world, but in it's real world location relative to your eyes. You could then instinctively reach out and place your hands on your keyboard without removing your Oculus Rift.
This could be done for your mouse, keyboard, controllers, headphones, cell phone or even your coffee mug; anything you might have cause to reach for during a play session. It might seem to break immersion to have this out-of-game object appear in your carefully crafted virtual world but it wouldn't be as bad as removing your Rift every time you want a caffeine fix.
5 Replies
- Yeah I've thought of that too. The issue to resolve are precise object tracking - we're pretty far from it, even with STEM module attached to every single thing. Besides, if virtual objects' scale and shape (and layout) doesn't match these of real objects, user will experience some serious trouble using them. I think your best bet so far is to use Rift-mounted camera and having chroma-key colored props.
"raidho36" wrote:
Yeah I've thought of that too. The issue to resolve are precise object tracking - we're pretty far from it, even with STEM module attached to every single thing. Besides, if virtual objects' scale and shape (and layout) doesn't match these of real objects, user will experience some serious trouble using them. I think your best bet so far is to use Rift-mounted camera and having chroma-key colored props.
In terms of keyboards it would more be about finding it with out taking the rift of. Although having an image of your keyboard projected in front of you while you are in the rift would help for those that have lost the home keys and aren't sure where to get back to them. This would require 2 rift mounted cameras which would probably need to be IPD adjustable. It would also require either markers on the item or some form of object recognition.- Couldn't you just view a camera view of yourself within the program.
For example, you could pull up what your camera sees within the program(the kinect that tracks the forward/backward movement).
Sure, it's not quite as elaborate as separate cameras that can record below you, but it would be effective for something like grabbing coffee without taking off the rift as you said. - Hey, that's not bad! You could mirror the view so it's makes sense to the player.
- I have an idea for full-dive that i don't know where to post but i'll do it anyway
Take an EEG, used to measure electrical impulses of the brain. If you would use a tech like that to send signals back as well as receive them, while at the same time diverting them into the PC (Player Character) rather than into a persons real body, then there is the full dive system right there. The only problem would be how to calibrate it all, but with the advanced tech we have, I have no doubt that it could be done.
would that work or would it just paralyze someone if they tested it. I'm not sure but there's my theory :D
