Developer Lucas Rizzotto has two apps that are available in the Windows Store for the HoloLens. One is MyLab, an educational app for chemistry, and the other is CyberSnake, an augmented reality (AR) title that makes use of spatial sound. In an interview on the Windows Blog, Rizzotto talks about what its like to develop for the HoloLens.
It comes as something of a surprise to learn that Rizzotto had never coded before he began work on MyLab and CyberSnake. He mostly came from a design background and had no idea how to code. So how did he get started? He answers: “I started by teaching myself C# and Unity to build the foundation I’d need to make the things I really wanted to make. The best part about it is how it gives me the ability to test crazy ideas really quickly and independently.”
As someone from a design background, Rizzotto found there were key differences in what worked in MR as opposed to traditional design: “One of the key things I learned is that you need to give up a little bit of control in your UX process and design applications more open ended. We’re working with human senses now, and people’s preferences vary wildly from human to human.”
Rizzotto has advice to offer those working with MR and AR design: “Experiment. A lot. Code up interactions that sound silly, and see what they feel like once you perform them. I try to do that even if I’m doing a serious enterprise application. It will usually give you a bunch of new creative and design insights that you would never be able to stumble upon otherwise.”
On use of spatial sound in MR applications he said: “Sound is an amazing way to reinforce behaviour – a general rule of thumb is to always have a sound to react to anything the user does, and make sure that the “personality” of said sound also matches the action that the user is performing thematically. If you’re approaching sound correctly, the way something looks and moves will be inseparable from the way it sounds.”
VRFocus will bring you further new on developments within Mixed Reality as it becomes available.