Dominic Brennan – Page 23 – Augmented & Virtual Reality Confabulation

March 8, 2017

Students Hack Positional Tracking onto Gear VR with SteamVR Tracking

In a reverse engineering exercise, two students at Utah State University have hacked positional tracking onto a Gear VR headset using SteamVR Tracking technology. Mobile VR solutions like Samsung’s Gear VR currently employ rotational tracking only.

The popular forms of mobile VR headsets, such as the Samsung Gear VR and Google Daydream View and Cardboard, are currently limited to rotational head tracking, meaning that you can look around comfortably from a single vantage point, but movements of the head through 3D space (like leaning forward or backward) cannot be tracking. Positional tracking adds not only comfort but also immersion to virtual reality, and is a feature of all major tethered VR headsets. However, achieving the same on mobile VR has proved challenging.

As a highly desirable feature for mobile VR headsets, positional tracking has been a priority for Oculus’ internal development for a long time, and various alternative solutions such as VicoVR and Univrses are beginning to appear. While the future points to self-contained, ‘inside-out’ tracking, already found on Microsoft’s Mixed Reality headsets and Google’s Tango technology, Utah State University students Brady Riddle and Sam Jungertat have created a positional tracking solution for Gear VR that uses Valve’s well-proven SteamVR Tracking system.

Three infrared sensors, detecting the flashes from an HTC base station (Lighthouse technology), are attached to the front of the Gear VR headset and connected to a microcontroller, which collects the timing data. The data is sent to a computer via UDP packet over Wi-Fi, and the results are displayed using the game engine Unity, as shown in the brief demonstration video heading this article.

Since Valve opened SteamVR technology to third parties for free, it has become easier to create tracked peripherals and other hardware. While it would be possible to create a product that provided positional tracking for the Gear VR in this manner, the student project was used to learn the technology, in a reverse engineering exercise. A detailed breakdown of the project and its inner workings is available here.

Though this project was academic in nature, it does point to one potential solution for positional tracking on mobile VR headsets—a system which would use rotational tracking as a baseline, but then be able to add positional tracking via the SteamVR Tracking technology when at home and near base stations.

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March 6, 2017

OSVR is Offering a 20% Discount on the HDK 2 for Students and Developers

OSVR is currently offering the HDK 2 at a 20% price reduction as part of their Academia and Developer Program. The HDK 2 is the most recent iteration of the organization’s open-source VR headset, normally priced at $399.

The OSVR HDK 2 sits in a unique position in the market, aimed towards developers of VR software and hardware, but also offering an interesting alternative to the Oculus Rift or HTC Vive for enthusiasts willing to take the risk on a not-consumer-ready device. Sharing similar display specifications to the current high-end PC VR headsets, and a positional tracking solution much like Oculus’ Constellation system, the HDK 2’s $399 price point remains competitive, even after the Rift’s recent drop to $499. As further incentive, a 20% discount is being offered to students and developers as part of the OSVR Academia and Developer Program.

By filling out the form on the OSVR website, you’ll be sent a discount code and instructions on how to complete the purchase. The site also notes that academic institutions purchasing multiple kits can receive a free HDK 1.3 (discontinued version with a single 1080p OLED panel, upgradeable to HDK 2 specs) for every two HDK 2 headsets purchased, for details the organization says to reach out to marketing@osvr.org.

Launched through a collaboration between Razer and Sensics, the OSVR initiative has gained support from the likes of Intel, Nvidia, and Valve, as well as some traction within the game developer community, with over 300 games listed as supported on Steam. The goal of democratising VR is detailed by Sensics CEO and OSVR co-founder Yuval Boger here.

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March 6, 2017

Photogrammetry Showcase ‘Realities’ Update Brings New Content, Touch Support, and Improved Visuals

Realities, a ‘virtual travel’ title that presents near photo-realistic VR captures of real-world locations, has received a major update. In addition to a new explorable location, the software has been overhauled to support forward rendering and improved support for Oculus Rift and Touch.

Practically as old as photography itself, use cases for photogrammetry (making measurements from photos) have evolved over time, from triangulation and georeferencing through to movie CGI production and most recently, real-time game environments. The Vanishing of Ethan Carter is a famous example of using the technique in Unreal Engine 3 (see The Astronauts’ blog for a detailed explanation), and Realities.io took a photo-realistic approach to create their free SteamVR product Realities using Unreal Engine 4, which launched alongside the HTC Vive in April 2016.

After a strong start, the Realities team remained fairly quiet as work went on behind the scenes. The limited selection of scanned environments is now being expanded, with a major update that adds 6 spots in California’s Death Valley, combined with new, atmospheric audio. The update also adds improved Oculus Rift and Touch support, and a number of visual improvements that affect all the environments, including a switch to forward shading, which allows for better anti-aliasing (now able to run on a minimum spec PC with 4xMSAA).

Full details can be found on Realities’ News page on Steam, and according to a developer post on Reddit, further scans are coming soon in diverse locations such as Maine State Prison, Cologne Cathedral, and Omaha Beach.

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March 3, 2017

‘Robo Recall’ Mod Adds Full Locomotion to Address Room-scale Niggles

Robo Recall has been given a locomotion mod for those looking for a less-restrictive movement system. Epic Games’ new VR shooter employs a teleport mechanic for movement, but has full mod support, allowing for additional experimental control systems.

Robo Recall, an Oculus Touch-exclusive action shooter, has only been available for three days and already the community has been treated to a mod that allows free-form locomotion. Like the majority of FPS titles built for VR, Epic Games designed Robo Recall’s gameplay around a teleportation mechanic, as traditional locomotion (with analog sticks) is a well-documented contributor to VR sickness. However, each time a game launches with a teleport system, a passionate crowd of gamers who aren’t adversely affected by artificial locomotion in VR complain about the missed opportunity.

User tonsta31, developer at MGSStudios, has been posting updates to his experimental locomotion mod on the Oculus community forums, which allows more traditional movement with the left analog stick on the Touch controller (in addition to teleporting). Unfortunately, Epic aren’t currently allowing mods to function in the story mode (due to the global leaderboards), so your locomotion antics will be limited to the mission mode.

The latest version 3 of the mod adds a locomotion tweak, jump, 45 degree snap turning, adjusted slo-mo, and fixed damage. The game appears to play well with the free movement already, although it does mess with some of the AI routines. Tonsta31 is working quickly however, and hopes to improve enemy response in a future update, as well has adding ‘new guns, a new level, a double jump and other bits’. It’s definitely worth keeping an eye on the forum thread.

SEE ALSO

'Robo Recall' Review

Epic’s mod support has also benefited those affected by the current rotation issues in roomscale setups. The 360 teleportation mod from developer Huge Robot solves the problem, and Epic has stated that an official resolution will be out by the end of the month.

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March 3, 2017

Oculus Cuts Price of Rift Sensors to $59

Alongside the $100 price cut of both Rift headset and Touch controllers, Oculus also permanently reduced the price of additional Sensors to $59. This is the first major price reduction for high-end PC VR hardware since launch.

Oculus have applied the first permanent price reduction for their PC VR hardware since the Rift launched in March 2016 – cutting $100 off both the headset and Touch motion controllers. This means a new Rift and Touch bundle is now $598, down from $798. The halving of the Touch price alone should tempt many Rift owners still on the fence about motion controllers to jump in, particularly with the added incentive of the recently-launched Robo Recall.

Lost in the excitement of this aggressive pricing strategy was the news that the Oculus Sensor has also dropped to $59, down from $79. This is good news for those who want to make use of a third sensor to create a roomscale VR play space. It also means that a viable roomscale setup is now available for $657, significantly undercutting the $799 HTC Vive, which has more hassle-free room-scale capabilities straight out of the box.

That said, despite Oculus making good progress, there are still some who seem to be fighting issues when equipped with 3 or more sensors, utilising the company’s “experimental” room-scale mode. Commenting on an Oculus subreddit in February, Nate Mitchell said that recent updates meant Oculus were seeing “improve tracking quality in aggregate” and that many problems were “too many sensors (4 or more sensors can suffer from USB challenges) and overall sensor positioning (sensors too far apart from each other and/or not enough overlap in field of view).” Oculus recently released version 1.12 of their Rift software, with still more improvements in this and other areas – so far feedback seems positive.

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March 3, 2017

Apple Reportedly Could Have Over 1,000 Engineers Working on AR in Israel

According to UBS analyst Steven Milunovich, Apple could have over 1,000 engineers working on Augmented Reality technology in Israel, mostly at its major R&D centre in Herzliya. Milunovich maintains Apple might introduce AR features similar to Google’s Tango in the next iPhone.

AR and VR technologies are in their infancy, but well past the proof-of-concept stage, and rival technology giants already offer consumer or developer products—such as Google’s Tango, Cardboard, and Daydream, and Microsoft’s HoloLens and Mixed Reality HMDs. Apple has no official AR or VR device, likely taking a typically reserved approach and refining the technology in secret. But Apple’s interest in Augmented Reality is well-documented, with many reports of hiring sprees and relevant company acquisitions over the years. CEO Tim Cook has been vocal about his preferences of AR over VR on several occasions.

an Apple patent displaying a phone-based head mounted display

This week, Business Insider reported further evidence that we may see an official AR solution integrated into the next iPhone, expected later this year. Within a research note from UBS analyst Steven Milunovich, he states “According to some industry sources, the company may have over 1,000 engineers working on a project in Israel that could be related to AR”. Some of Apple’s most significant R&D projects take place in Israel, having been invested in the region since 2011, following the purchase of Israeli flash memory producer Anobit. Along with its major development centre in Herzliya, the UBS analyst also references Apple’s AR-related acquisitions PrimeSense and RealFace, both based in Tel Aviv.

Milunovich goes on to suggest the AR elements in the next iPhone could include “moderate 3D mapping … and possibly an AR software development kit”. MacRumors claims to have seen Milunovich’s notes too, going into further detail about the ‘3D mapping’, describing it as a Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) technology, which is also a major feature of Google’s Tango platform.

As always, all industry eyes will be on Apple once they decide to reveal their progress – and it is increasingly likely to be this year. 2017 marks the 10th anniversary of the iPhone, and following a disappointingly-incremental update last year, the new model could be something very special, making huge leaps in design, features and performance.

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March 2, 2017

PSVR Aim Controller Launches with ‘Farpoint’ on May 16th, Co-op Confirmed

At GDC 2017, developers Impulse Gear confirmed that their VR shooter Farpoint has Co-op, and will launch in a bundle with the PS VR Aim Controller on May 16th. An ‘unnerving space adventure set on a hostile alien world’, Farpoint is a free-movement FPS exclusive to PlayStation VR.

Build from the group up for PlayStation VR by independent studio Impulse Gear, Farpoint is a free-movement FPS designed to be played with the PS VR Aim Controller. While the game can be played on a standard PS4 gamepad, the new peripheral was developed by Sony with input from Impulse Gear, and will be launching as a bundle on May 16th.

During a developer session at this week’s GDC about the Aim controller, which is expected to receive support for several future PS VR titles, Impulse Gear confirmed Farpoint will have a co-op mode.

The PSVR Aim Controller has a friendlier appearance than the gun-like Sharp Shooter PS3 accessory, and benefits from having PlayStation Move-style features such as a tracking sphere, trigger and thumbstick integrated into the unit, meaning no separate Move controllers are required. The integrated motion sensors mean that the new controller is more accurate than the Sharp Shooter, able to deliver 1:1 tracking of the in-game weapon.

Farpoint is most notable for its free movement (often referred to as ‘full locomotion’) – something that is typically avoided in VR FPS in favour of a teleport mechanic due to its tendency to cause nausea. The 1:1 weapon tracking, combined with careful attention to movement speed and animation, assisted by IKinema’s real-time inverse kinematics, means that it is able to deliver a comfortable experience, as described in our hands-on.

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March 2, 2017

Google Has Shipped Over 10 Million Cardboard Viewers

The Google VR team shared some impressive figures at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week – more than 10 million Cardboard viewers have been shipped worldwide. Google’s low-cost smartphone enclosure for viewing VR content has been available since 2014.

With media attention on Oculus’ successes in reinvigorating the VR industry in 2014, Google’s surprise announcement of Cardboard looked like an amusing experiment, but it quickly became a huge success, as it was just good enough to provide anyone with a smartphone a small taste of VR. At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week, and announced via Google’s blog, the team revealed that more than 10 million Cardboard viewers have shipped worldwide, with 160 million downloads of Cardboard apps on Google Play. The 30 most popular apps have more than 1 million downloads.

With two small lenses fixed inside a basic cardboard enclosure, Google’s Cardboard design never intended to deliver a truly immersive VR experience, but it provided an incredibly lower barrier for entry, and a stepping stone towards Google’s high-performance mobile VR solution, Daydream. In turn, the research and investment in software development for the Daydream ecosystem has filtered back to Cardboard; since October, Cardboard apps running Google’s VR SDK share some of the performance improvements developed for Daydream-ready phones. As such, Cardboard is likely to continue to remain relevant for years to come.

The Google VR team also took the opportunity to announce Sky VR, a new premium VR video content app, and three new augmented reality experiences – The Sims, Chelsea Kicker and WSJ AR – for Tango-enabled devices.

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March 1, 2017

Windows Mixed Reality Dev Headsets Ship This Month, VR Content Coming to Xbox Scorpio

The Acer Windows Mixed Reality Development Edition headset is shipping this month, the first HMD to include the inside-out tracking technology pioneered on the HoloLens. This marks the beginning of the rollout of Microsoft-endorsed VR headsets that support ‘world scale’ tracking and ‘mixed reality’ apps.

Originally announced at Microsoft’s keynote in October 2016, VR headsets with inside-out tracking from HP, Dell, Lenovo, ASUS, and Acer (with another from 3Glasses revealed in December), are due to launch later this year. The rollout of the developer kit begins this month in the form of the ‘Acer Windows Mixed Reality Development Edition headset’.

Microsoft insist on using the term ‘mixed reality’, despite the new headsets being much like any other VR headset, but using inside-out tracking. The Acer unit uses two 90Hz 1440×1440 panels – totally opaque, unlike Microsoft’s HoloLens, which has a transparent visor to overlay images over the real world. Gesture tracking, another key pillar of the HoloLens experience, is also missing from the Acer HMD. The ‘mixed reality’ delivered by the Acer headset is defined by the inside-out tracking system, which provides positional tracking without the need for external sensors, as well as being able to outline real-world objects so that you don’t walk into them, and ability to access the Windows Holographic environment.

The devkit will include access to Windows 10 Insider preview builds and the SDK to enable developers to build mixed reality applications. Announced at GDC 2017 and via the Windows Blog, Microsoft has broad plans beyond the Windows desktop and HoloLens, bringing mixed reality content to the Xbox One family of devices, including Project Scorpio, in 2018.

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March 1, 2017

Oculus’ Jason Rubin on Wireless VR “the Wrong Direction for Right Now”

Speaking at GDC 2017, Jason Rubin described VR wireless technology as “compressed, not perfect, and expensive” and “the wrong direction for right now”. Rubin’s task at Oculus is to deliver compelling VR content, and believes that hardware features such as wireless, while desirable, simply add to the cost of a product that is already considered too expensive.

As Oculus’ VP of Content, Jason Rubin’s priorities are steered towards delivering a strong software lineup, but he offered some thoughts about emerging VR hardware technologies when speaking to PCGamesN at GDC 2017. Following the positive reaction to low-latency wireless accessories like KwikVR and TPCAST, and influential figures like Gabe Newell suggesting that PC VR headsets will have integrated solutions in 2018, the expectation for wireless high-end VR is rising.

However, it adds a significant cost to products that are already considered very expensive for mainstream adoption, and Rubin believes it is currently the wrong move. “If we add wireless, but it adds $200 to the price of the headset, I think we’re moving in the wrong direction for right now. Some may want it, so as a peripheral it’s interesting, but I don’t think it should be our focus right now, I think our focus should be on bringing the core experience we have down in cost before we add features.”

The transmission module of the TPCAST accessory seen sporting HDMI and USB ports

Rubin is being realistic. The hardware needs to improve, but it has to become more affordable as well, and ultimately appeal equally to the mainstream consumer and the enthusiast. In any case, it will remain a matter of tradeoffs. The existing wireless solutions are close to the limit of bandwidth to stream current resolutions at 90Hz, and increasing resolution and FOV is the main expectation for the next generation of VR HMDs. “They’re getting it, not to say it doesn’t work, but it’s compressed, it’s not perfect and it’s expensive”, he says. “If we go wireless and then we decide we’re going to increase the resolution of the screens, now all of a sudden we may have to go back to a wire.”

It’s clear that Rubin is discussing the short term here. Wireless is the future, and Oculus’ own Chief Scientist Michael Abrash laid down some impressive predictions of where the hardware could be in five years, which include a wireless solution supporting 4Kx4K displays per eye. Valve are certainly not afraid of pushing the hardware at a high price. Speaking at a recent press event, Gabe Newell described the Vive, which is the most expensive VR device on the market, as “barely capable of doing a marginally adequate job of delivering a VR experience”, and believes major hardware improvements are required to make VR compelling enough for the mainstream, warning that high-end systems will remain very expensive.

While it may appear that Valve and Oculus have different priorities here, it’s all a matter of interpretation. Both companies are heavily invested in delivering content and developing future VR hardware solutions – it just depends on who you talk to, and what timescale they’re prepared to talk about. Right now, Rubin’s message is clear. “The two things we think are most important in pushing PC VR forward right now are better and better content and better and better price”.

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